Henry Reynolds-Moreton The 2nd Earl of Ducie

The New Sporting Magazine         Issue 24               1852    Page 64

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE THE EARL OF DUCIE. ENGRAVED BY J. B. HUNT, FROM A PAINTING BY 6. V. BRIGGS, R.A.

Henry George Francis Reynolds Moreton, Baron Ducie and Moreton, of Tortworth and Woodchester, in the county of Gloucester, was born in the spring of 1802, and succeeded his father as Earl of Ducie in 1840; having married, in 1826, Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Lord Sherborne, by whom he has a numerous family. The Ducies, accord- ing to The Peerage," are no new creation; for they run directly back to the times of our first Charles, when one Sir Robert Ducie, a banker, and Lord Mayor of London, had his loyalty and devotion to the luckless monarch taxed at a high price-losing, it is said, eighty thou- sand pounds in his support of the king's fortunes. The title, however, was not made out sooner than 1720, the second adopted, according to usage, by the heir of the house, being acquired by marriage with the Moretons, a family of long standing at Moreton, in Staffordshire.

The above gives us the pedigree of a nobleman who for upwards of twelve seasons figured not only as a master of hounds, but also as their huntsman. The sport the Lord Moreton of those times showed during his management will not soon be forgotten in the Vale of White Horse; nor, indeed, the style and pluck with which he kept to it so long as health allowed him. Commencing as a M. F. H. early in life, so far back in fact as 1830, Lord Ducie continued to hunt his country up to 1843. The reputation he here acquired as a straight-forward sports- man would scarcely require any great detail or lengthened comment had we not fortunately an estimate ready at hand from the very highest authority. Poor Nimrod, during one of the very last tours he made (in 1839) took Lord Ducie's (or as he was then Lord Moreton's) establishment in his round of inspection; and we gladly avail ourselves of a few extracts that could not come more appropriate than they will in con- junction with the portrait we give.

Take his lordship, first of all, as Nimrod himself did, that is as a rider to hounds, here we have it just to the point :-

"Of Lord Moreton's own style of riding I need not trouble myself to say much were I merely addressing sportsmen who hunt in the mid- land counties, inasmuch as to such it is well known. I believe no man ever travelled more straight to hounds than he has done, and occasionally too straight, the consequence of short-sightedness, which is a great dis advantage to any one who takes a lead. For example, he once rode at a wall on the other side of which was a stone-quarry, which was nearly proving his grave. His horse was killed on the spot, and himself only saved by having recourse to that presence of mind which becomes habitual to persons frequently exposed to danger. But his lordship's sang froid on the occasion was, as the Badminton groom would say, extraordinary above a bit!' He first shouted out Ware quarry!" to those who might be coming his line; and looking at his horse and finding him dead, merely called to one of the whips, and said, 'Give me your horse, Jack,' proceeding at once to his hounds, which were running hard at the time. Unfortunately for his stable, this horse was

Page 65

one of three first-rate ones, which he had purchased of Mr. Richard Gurney for one thousand guineas.

"Generally speaking Lord Moreton is remarkable for riding slow at his fences, which all good judges-heavy weights in particular-do and ought to do. As may be supposed, he rides what are called great slapping horses,' with as much blood as he can get them. His lord- ship's best horse at present is one called Bittern, and his history is worth notice. He was a determined run-away; bought by his present owner as such, and at a corresponding price. The first time he rode him with hounds he ran away with him for forty-five minutes, but did not give him a fall. Finding it no joke to run away with fifteen stone, he never repeated the experiment. And here again is another "rum-un his lordship it appears went equally well on.

One of the most extraordinary animals perhaps ever heard of to carry a fast man of high weight, is a chesnut mare Lord Moreton rode for many seasons. In the first place no person knows how she is bred, and in the next her appearance is most plebeian. The owner told me he never tired her; and I was informed in another quarter that he was the only man in the field who cleared a stiff paled fence and ditch on this mare, towards the close of a run. I myself, indeed, saw one most difficult fence that she carried his lordship over, out of a road. It was a stone stile approached by four steps."

It was not, however, merely when hounds were going well that Lord Moreton thought of them, as hark to Nimrod again :-

"No man ever made himself signal as a sportsman unless his heart and soul were in the pursuit; and how far Lord Moreton's zeal carried him may be estimated by the following fact. During a session in which he sat in the House-but he soon cried enough' of that-he was in the habit of travelling all night from London, and often returning after hunting to be present at a division. And how did he travel? In a comfortable travelling carriage, four posters, &c.? Not he, in troth ; but in a gig, with relays of horses on the road."

In these railway double quick times many may do what few could as Lord Ducie then did it, and we do not wonder at his even tiring. The practice, however, led to a performance that may find especial favour in the eyes of the gallant challenger who just now is backing a certain young lady to do so many wonderful things-killing her fox amongst them. His lordship's feat was this:-

"He made a bet-and won it-that he would one day (i.e., within twenty-fours) kill two brace of partridges with his gun; a fox with his hounds; and divide in the House of Commons."

And, side by side with this, we have chronicled an equally severe succession of work :-

Then his ride to Melton, to see a mare belonging to Mr. Thomlin, that sporting Leicestershire grazier, who would be called an esquire in Wales. He was only two days about it, taking his chance of post- horses, seeing a run with Lord Lonsdale into the bargain, and I believe staking the mare."

So far we have seen Lord Ducie only in the field or the stable, but * It was when on canvass for his seat that the then Honourable Mr. Moreton encountered the celebrated sweep, who "Can't vote for you, 'cos I hunts with the Duke." F 

Page 66

JURYMAN'S APOLOGY FOR "FAIR PLAY IS A JEWEL !” he ranks equally high in the kennel; and his style of hound was gene- rally allowed to be famously adapted for the country he hunted. Nimrod thus describes them a year or two before they were lent, and ultimately given, to Lord Henry Bentinck :-

"His lordship told me I should find them a rough-and-ready lot; and why not? Roughness is one of the characteristics of the fox-hound 'pitiless and rough' should he be, as Shakspeare says of the wolf- dog; if ready when wanted-nothing more is required. My opinion, however, of Lord Moreton's hounds is this-they are powerful to a degree not often seen; as I said of Jubilee's litter, they are exuberant in muscle, and especially so in their thighs and stifles, which they ought to be to enable them to stand the severe work they must have in such constant travelling. With all there power their is no lumber-their condition sufficiently good, and generally so sizeable, that amongst the dog hounds, with the exception of President, I think I could not have pointed out one half an inch higher or lower than his neighbour." "As a huntsman," writes another correspondent, who had ample opportunity of judging, "Lord Ducie was always with his hounds, and could perhaps get them away from covert and kill his fox in as quick and fine style as any man in England." We think we might stop here, but" our own commissioner," as Nimrod would have been styled in these times, could not forbear just hinting a bit of prophecy that has since been amply fulfilled-

"Lord Moreton's taste in country amusements is not confined to fox-hunting; he is a great agriculturist, and is often in the chair at the Gloucester Agricultural Society. In fact, some of his friends feel alarm, lest the charms of a pastoral life may not at length prevail to the relinquishment of the hounds; inasmuch as, say they, he will now give one hundred and fifty guineas for a bull calf, and not more than a hundred for a hunter.”

And, alas these sad forebodings are all realized; the charms of the pastoral life have prevailed. Mr. Smart and his clippers have gone their ways, and Mr. Strafford and the shorthorns reign in their stead.