Lake country sketches

by H. D. Rawnsley

A NORTH COUNTRY NIMROD.

We shall never hear again
On the fell or in the plain
John Crozier's 'Tally-ho!'
Never see him through the rain
And the sun, with might and main
Follow on from crag to crag, while the hounds give tongue below.

Dark the valley east and west,
Clouds are on Blencathra's crest.
The hunter home has gone:
And the Squire they loved the best
Now is carried to his rest—
Eighty years has Death the huntsman followed hard—the
chase is done.

But I think I see him stand—
Rough mountain-staff in hand,
Fur cap and coat of grey—
With a smile for all the hand
Of the sportsmen in the land,
And a word for all the merry men who loved his 'Hark-away!'

Last hunter of your race!
As we bear you to your place,
We forget the hounds and horn,
But the tears are on our face,
For we mind your deeds of grace,
Loving-kindness late and early shown to all the village-born.

'It's a dark daay for Threlkett is this un, hooiver! T'ald Squire's gone doon!—girtest Master of t' dogs i' Cummerland sin Jwohn Peel I'se warrant him—an' a gay tiff aid feller an' aw. Deeth has hoaled him at last; but what, he'd bin runnin' gaame fer mair nor eighty year noo. He's bin at Maister-o-hunt job langer nor ony man i' t' whoale counttry, I suppoase, has t' aid Squire. It's sixty-fowr year or mair sin he took t' horn. Eh, my! bit what a heart he hed! Kindest-hearted man i' these parts—niver wad let a nebbor-body want for owt if he thowt he cud dea good by lendin' a hand, and pertikler fond o' t' barns; school children was fit to be mad wid him on treat-daays. And why what, he gat scheul-hoose builded, and laid doon a hoondred poond fer Parish Room, let alean gevin site i' t' village. It's a dark day fer Threlkett, I'se telling ye, and dogs hes lost best friend and t' foxes t' warst enemy they've ivver hed here-aboot.'

We were standing by the Druid's Circle on Castrigg Fell, and as the old yeoman spoke to me I looked across the valley to the great buttressed height of Blencathra—blacker to-day beneath, by reason of the slight snow covering on its summit, and saw in its grove of larches the white house, half-farm, half-mansion, whence the oldest Master of the Hunt, in Britain, had gone for his far journey. Never again would the men who follow the hounds pass through the gate of the Riddings, with the fox and the hound carved in stone on either side of them, to be met and to be greeted by the cheery old Squire on hunting days; never again, after a long day's hunt, would they repair to the Farrier Inn or to the Salutation Inn, mid-village, to wait the coming of the Master 'ere they all 'howked in' to the 'tatie-pot' he had provided them.

There was a time when all the farmhouses for miles round, and every cottage home, was glad, because a Threlkeld man had come to his own again, and I could not help contrasting the gladness of that day, as told us by Wordsworth in his Feast of Brougham Castle, and Song of the Shepherd Lord, with the sadness of this day for all the country side, now that another shepherd-lord had gone unto his own. That shepherd-lord we read

'Was honoured more and more,
And ages after he was laid in earth
"The good Lord Clifford" was the name he bore.'

They were very different men, that shepherd-lord and this our friend, the Master of the Blencathra Hunt, John Crozier: but both of them had been reared in the same quiet pastoral scene, and among the same fine race of shepherd gentlemen. Both had learned the lesson of this mountain side,—

'Love had they found in huts where poor men lie,
Their daily teachers had been woods and hills,
The silence that is in the starry sky,
The sleep that is among the lonely hills.'

Both men had won the hearts of the simple people far and near, and ages after he is laid in earth, as he will be laid by the side of his beloved wife, in the Threlkeld Churchyard, men will speak of 't'ald Squire,' and enthusiastically tell of his hunting feats, and remember how he loved his native village.

The love of hunting which John Crozier inherited from his father, who lived at Gate Ghyll Farm on Blencathra's side, and who turned over to his son the mastership of what were then spoken of as 'the Threlkeld dogs' in the year 1840, is a passion with our dales' folk which only those who live amongst them can understand.

The 'varmint' is the natural enemy of the shepherd, and this adds zest to the day's sport. In our churchwardens' accounts of old time there appears the item 'A fox head, 21s.,' and though in other chapelries 3s. 4d. appears to have been the price paid, such a scourge must Reynard have become that the churchwardens felt they were justified in giving a whole week's wage for the destruction of one fox. Down at Shoulthwaite and, for aught I know, in other dales a fox trap of masonry existed till of late years, built beehive fashion with a hole in the top. If Reynard ventured in to the bait, which was a fine fat hen, he was a prisoner; try to scale the walls how he might the artful one was foiled; but to trap a fox goes against the grain. There are certain things in which our hunt differs from others. Class distinctions are unknown in the field. The Master of the Hunt knows all by their Christian name. It is a social gathering from daylight to dark. The luxury of horses, too, is unknown. The field are all running huntsmen of the type of old Timothy, of whom Wordsworth wrote, in the year 1800—the childless Timothy who took up his staff, and with the thought of his last child's death heavy upon him could nevertheless not refuse the invitation of 'the horn and the hark! hark-away,' and 'went to the chase with a tear on his cheek.'

On that day when 'Skiddaw was glad with the cry of the hounds,' old Timothy's daughter Ellen had been dead five months or more, or he probably would not have followed the hunt, for there is a kind of etiquette that the hunters in the dales observe, and they would no more go a-hunting within a month after the death of their beloved, than they would miss going to church on the Sunday following the funeral. I remember once being asked by a widower, who was in great sorrow and could not get away from his thoughts, whether he should take what he knew to be the best physic—a day with the dogs. I asked, 'What would your wife have said?' His answer came quite straight: 'She wad hev clapped a bit o' lunch in my pocket, gi'en me ma staff, shut door upon me, and telt me not to show my feace until supper time.' I answered, 'That's enough,' and the man was a new being when he returned from the hunt, more able to wrestle with his sorrows.

The women folk are as keen as their husbands. They tell of a 'woman body' at Wythburn who, joining the hounds in full cry, and finding her skirts in the way, stopped, took a knife out of her pocket, and slit her petticoat in order that with a 'divided skirt' she might the surer be in at the kill. How keen the men are, is shown by the fact that beginning as youngsters to follow the drag, and carrying on a love of the sport through the prime of manhood, they may be still found from 75 to 80 and over, out with the hounds at the call of the horn. Nay, even when their sight fails them, they will follow, and it is on record that a veteran whose eyes were failing him and who had the rare good luck of a vantage ground to see the finish of the hunt, and was so maddened by the hurried and eager account from his companions of how the hunt was going, that he cried out 'Hang thur aid een o' mine! I wish that they wer nobbut out all togidder; I believe I wad see better through t' hooals!'

Fox hunting in the Lake Country tests the sportsman. None but a true lover of the chase would be content to breakfast and get away with the stars (as in winter he oft-times has to do that he may get to the heights before the hounds are loosed)—and, facing all weathers, come back with the stars. He has to battle with storm and tempest. It may be fine in one valley and a roaring blizzard on the other side of the mountain. The old veteran, John Crozier, himself would tell of how he had to lie down on Skiddaw summit in a sudden and blinding snowstorm, and on more than one occasion he and all the hunt have suddenly been enveloped in a thick mist, which made movement almost impossible. And hunting not only tries the heart, it tries the head. A fox gets 'binked,' as they call it, or banked, and some one must go up on an almost inaccessible crag to put in the terrier; and a man must know the country, and the probable run of every fox that gets up in front of the hounds. There is no earth stopping; only the bields are known, and the cunning of Reynard is a secret, to be learnt not only by the huntsman and whip but by every single man in the field. As for the foxes, though the old greyhound breed that John Peel knew—20 lbs. to 29 lbs. in weight—have passed away, the little black-legged Irish fox can give a good account of himself, and from three to five hours and from 25 to 40 miles have not been an uncommon experience of a run.

At the beginning of last century it was not an unusual thing for the hounds to be running 'on the tops' through the night, and the legends of the 'whish-hounds,' or 'spirit-packs' of Cornwall and Devon might very well have been reborn in Borrowdale.

In 1858 took place one of the record runs of the Blencathra pack. The dogs had had already a good morning's work when at noon a big Skiddaw fox jumped up in front of them. He tried to shake off his pursuers by the ordinary hill tactics, but, failing, took to the valley, went by Crosthwaite Church, through Portinscale and Brandelhow, right up Borrowdale, and over the Styhead into Westmoreland. The night fell, but the dogs were heard at Black Hill, marking the fox at an earth. Thence Reynard escaped in the direction of Lancashire, and next day the hounds and the fox were found, the latter dead and the former fast asleep under a crag in Coniston. They must have travelled not far short of sixty miles over the very roughest part of the Lake Country.

The hounds are trained carefully not to break up their foxes, just as they are trained as carefully not to worry sheep; and this latter is done by the farmers walking the dogs in the summer time and taking them, along with their collies, when they go shepherding on the fells.

The packs are small, but every hound is true as steel. The Blencathra huntsman generally unkennels about 11 couples, and so keen are they at their work that three years ago they gave an account of 76 foxes, last year of 46, and this year, up to date, of 43. But the cost of keeping the pack is very small. £200 clears all expenses, and this is partly accounted for by the kindly interest farmers, who are all members of the hunt, take in it, for they walk the dogs free of charge, and some of them are, in addition, subscribers. Very anxious are these men, too, to do their best by the dogs. The hounds are made members of the family, and their tempers and individualities are studied. A farmer would take it very ill if he did not have the same hound sent him at the end of the hunting season. This reacts by making a bond of enthusiastic interest for members of the field in the running of every dog.

Nor can we omit to mention the sense of brotherhood which binds the hunt together. As there is no separation of class, so there is no separation of dress; no buttonholes and fine leather boots. The hunting kit is but a flannel shirt, a pair of trousers rolled up to the knee, over a pair of stout woollen hose, a Tam o' Shanter, and a rough alpenstock. The poorest can afford that, and the richest know no better.

Another bond that unites the members of the Blencathra Hunt is the home-made hunting songs which are sung at the end of the day. There is one written by a Patterdale yeoman, which has a good ring in it:

'Now who could help but follow when notes as sweet as these
Are sounding through the valley and borne upon the breeze?
Of all the recreations by which our lives are blest,
The chase among the mountains is the purest and the best.'

And there is another favourite written by Harper, one of the roadmen in the neighbourhood; while Woodcock Graves' immortal ditty, 'D'ye ken John Peel?' is never better sung than at the annual dinner of the Blencathra Hunt.

I am standing at the Druids' Circle and looking across at Naddle. In the hollow of the ridge is the school of S. John's-in-the-Vale. I remember that the old Squire, John Crozier, got his first learning at that school; and that some years after a poet of more than local fame, John Richardson, became its schoolmaster. He, too, immortalised the Blencathra Hunt, and one of his best songs will, for many years to come, echo the 'tally-ho!' of the late Master of the Hunt:

'The hunt is up, the hunt is up;
Auld Tolly's in the drag;
Hark to him, beauties, git away,
He's gone for Skiddaw Crag.
Rise fra ye'r beds, ye sleepy-heads,
If ye wad plesser know;
Ye'r hearts 't will cheer, if ye bit hear
John Crozier's "Tally-ho!"'

That last line calls us back to the man who has carried on, to a century's ending, the Mastership of the pack his father gave him in charge.

A NORTH COUNTRY NIMROD.

As a lad of 18, John Crozier was already well known as a keen sportsman, as good with his rod in the becks and rivers here about, as he was with his father's hounds, and fond of wrestling as he was of hunting. At that day the pack numbered only six couples. They were kept at the farms all through the year, and were trained to meet at the sound of the Master's horn. The old Squire would often tell how he would stand on Kiln Hill, blow a blast, and watch the beauties racing across the meadows to his call. John Peel, in those days, was still hunting on the other side of Skiddaw, and John Crozier remembered the last time he saw him was under Wanthwaite Crags, where, after a long day's run, he invited the old veteran, who was on his white pony, to come home to supper. 'Nay, nay, John,' said Peel, 'I'se freetened o' gettin' neeted (benighted),' and so went back on his way to Ruthwaite supperless. 'But I'll see thee again,' he added—who knows they may again have met.

The first thing the young Master did was to improve the breed of his hounds, and this he accomplished by getting a strain from John Peel's kennels. How much of Ruby, 'Ranter, Royal, and Bellman, so true,' spoken of in the song, still runs in the blood of the Blencathra pack, I know not. Other strains since then have been introduced, but a hardier pack never breasted a mountain side, and there is not one of them who would not carry on the line himself, if his fellows failed, to the death.

John Crozier once received the following note: 'To J. Crozier, Esq., M.F.H., from Isaac and Edward Brownrigg, of Brownrigg. This hound (Darling) brought a splendid dog-fox, and after a very exciting hunt ultimately caught it in our house field. About an hour afterwards other five dogs came. After being fed they left, but this one would not leave. We intend having the fox preserved.' After carrying on the hounds at his own cost for 30 years, 'the Squire,' as he was always called, at the request of his neighbours, allowed them to become a subscription pack, in the year 1870. There was a general feeling in the dales that it was not fair to allow all the burden to be upon one man, and on the conditions that he would remain Master, and in case of the hunt ceasing, the hounds should be returned to him. A treasurer and secretary were appointed, and the Blencathra Hunt went on merrily as before.

The Master was fortunate in his huntsmen. Joseph Fearon, of honoured memory, was succeeded by Isaac Todhunter, who carried the horn for 25 years. Isaac Todhunter handed it on to John Porter, who for a like time kept up the best traditions of the pack, which Jem Dalton carries on to-day. The names of these past huntsmen, with other members of the hunt, are inscribed on the stone of memorial raised in the Threlkeld Churchyard at the charges of the Squire and a few friends; and that pillar in the King's dale—for of this dale John Crozier was truly king—if it does nothing else, goes to prove that the following of the foxes in the Lake District adds years, even as it adds cheer, to the lives of the dalesmen. Thus, for example, one sees that many of the hunters were fourscore years before they were run to earth; one was 89, another 91, another 95, and a fourth 98.

Up till the past two years the old Master of the hunt presided at the annual hunt dinner, but it was known that his health was failing, and though each week up to the end he kept in touch with all the doings of his pack, he did not leave his house. Still week by week members of the hunt would go up and have a 'crack' with him—always to be received with the same courteous inquiry, 'Well, how about your wives and families, are they well? That's right. Is any news stirring? What about the House last night?' He took the keenest interest in politics up to the end, and that came, not unexpectedly, at two o'clock on a quiet starlit morning, Thursday, 5th March, 1903.

I could not wonder that my old friend the yeoman had said it was a dark day for Threlkeld, for he had lived among his own people, and loved them to the end. How they loved him may be gathered from the fact that two days before he died, a casket containing a book in which every householder in the parish had entered his name, with an illuminated address, full of affection and gratitude, for the friendship towards them of a long life, was brought to the house. 'Ya kna,' said my friend, 'they knew t' aid Squire was house-fast, and they likely thowt 't wad cheer 'im up a laal bit.' He never saw it, for it was thought he was too ill to be 'fashed' with it, and he is beyond all earthly cheering now; 'the Hunter is home from the Hill.'

On the following Monday there was such a gathering together of the dalesmen from far and near as had never been seen in Threlkeld Church, or Threlkeld Churchyard. They sang one of the old Squire's favourite hymns. They bore the coffin to the grave with the veteran's hunting cap and crop and the brush of the last fox killed by his pack upon it, and before and after the service they talked of him kindly, as Cumberland folk ever do of the dead; they spoke of him, not only as the oldest Master of Foxhounds in the land, but as a man who entered into all the social enjoyments of the country-side, and whilst on terms of close intimacy, almost familiarity, with the companions, retained their regard, and in some things set them a good example.

For in an age when the gambling spirit was abroad, it will be remembered that John Crozier never bet a penny in his life. 'I did yance think o' betting a hawpeth o' snaps,' he once said in the vernacular; 'but I kind of considered it ower, and I didn't.' It will be remembered of him, too, that he was against the use of bad language in the field, and that he never would allow, if he could help it, a bit of scandal or 'ill gien gossip.' If he heard one man running down another or passing an unkind judgment, or setting an unkind tale 'agate,' he would jerk out, 'There, noo, thoo mun let that hare sit'—and it sat. 'Ay, ay,' said an old friend as he turned away from the graveyard, 'tho' he said nowt about it, he was a kind o' a religious man, was varra partial to certain hymns, and had his favourite psalms, that he wad gang off quietly to his bit summerhoose most mornings, and tek his prayer book with him. They say t' housekeeper, after her master's death, found t' aid beuk laid open on summerhoose taable, I suppose.'

But as they left the churchyard they all in memory saw the old Master in his sealskin cap, with the lappets about his ears—squarely built and strong, with his alpenstock in hand, as the prefatory verse tells:

But I think I see him stand,
Rough mountain staff in hand,
Fur cap and coat of grey,
With a smile for all the band
Of the sportsmen in the land,
And a word for all the merry men who loved his 'Hark away!'

And as they thought of what he has been to them for the last 65 years in the Threlkeld vale, they admitted the truth of the following words:

Last hunter of your race!
As we bear you to your place,
We forget the hounds and horn,
But the tears are on our face,
For we mind your deeds of grace,
Loving-kindness, late and early, unto all the village-born.