Vol. I.--2.
[Illustration: ~Emigration of the Deer from Cranbourn Chase, 1826~]
The genial years increase the timid herd
Till wood and pasture yield a scant supply;
Then troop the deer, as at a signal word,
And in long lines o’er barren downs they hie,
In search what food far vallies may afford--
Less fearing man, their ancient enemy,
Than in their native chase to starve and die.
The deer of Cranbourn chase usually average about ten thousand in
number. In the winter of 1826, they were presumed to amount to from
twelve to fifteen thousand. This increase is ascribed to the unusual
mildness of recent winters, and the consequent absence of injuries which
the animals are subject to from severe weather.
In the month of November, a great number of deer from the woods and
pastures of the Chase, between Gunvile and Ashmore, crossed the narrow
downs on the western side, and descended into the adjacent parts of the
vale of Blackmore in quest of subsistence. There was a large increase in
the number about twelve years preceding, till the continued deficiency
of food occasioned a mortality. Very soon afterwards, however, they
again increased and emigrated for food to the vallies, as in the present
instance. At the former period, the greater part were not allowed or
were unable to return.
The tendency of deer to breed beyond the means of support, afforded by
parks and other places wherein they are kept, has been usually regulated
by converting them into venison. This is clearly more humane than
suffering the herds so to enlarge, that there is scarcely for “every one
a mouthfull, and no one a bellyfull.” It is also better to pay a good
price for good venison in season, than to have poor and cheap venison
from the surplus of starving animals “killed off” in mercy to the
remainder, or in compliance with the wishes of landholders whose grounds
they invade in their extremity.
The emigration of the deer from Cranbourn Chase suggests, that as such
cases arise in winter, their venison may be bestowed with advantage on
labourers, who abound more in children than in the means of providing
for them; and thus the surplus of the forest-breed be applied to the
support and comfort of impoverished human beings.
* * * * *
_Cranbourn._
Cranbourn is a market town and parish in the hundred of Cranbourn,
Dorsetshire, about 12 miles south-west from Salisbury, and 93 from
London. According to the last census, it contains 367 houses and 1823
inhabitants, of whom 104 are returned as being employed in trade. The
parish includes a circuit of 40 miles, and the town is pleasantly
situated in a fine champaign country at the north-east extremity of the
county, near Cranbourn Chase, which extends almost to Salisbury. Its
market is on a Thursday, it has a cattle market in the spring, and its
fairs are on St. Bartholomew’s and St. Nicholas’ days. It is the capital
of the hundred to which it gives its name, and is a vicarage valued in
the king’s books at £6. 13_s._ 4_d._ It is a place of high antiquity,
famous in the Saxon and Norman times for its monastery, its chase, and
its lords. The monastery belonged to the Benedictines, of which the
church at the west end of the town was the priory.[8]
* * * * *
_Affray in the Chase._
On the night of the 16th of December, 1780, a severe battle was fought
between the keepers and deer-stealers on Chettle Common, in Bursey-stool
Walk. The deer-stealers had assembled at Pimperne, and were headed by
one Blandford, a sergeant of dragoons, a native of Pimperne, then
quartered at Blandford. They came in the night in disguise, armed with
deadly offensive weapons called swindgels, resembling flails to thresh
corn. They attacked the keepers, who were nearly equal in number, but
had no weapons but sticks and short hangers. The first blow was struck
by the leader of the gang, it broke a knee-cap of the stoutest man in
the chase, which disabled him from joining in the combat, and lamed him
for ever. Another keeper, from a blow with a swindgel, which broke three
ribs, died some time after. The remaining keepers closed in upon their
opponents with their hangers, and one of the dragoon’s hands was severed
from the arm, just above the wrist, and fell on the ground; the others
were also dreadfully cut and wounded, and obliged to surrender.
Blandford’s arm was tightly bound with a list garter to prevent its
bleeding, and he was carried to the lodge. The Rev. William Chafin, the
author of “Anecdotes respecting Cranbourn Chase,” says, “I saw him there
the next day, and his hand in the window: as soon as he was well enough
to be removed, he was committed, with his companions, to Dorchester
gaol. The hand was buried in Pimperne church-yard, and, as reported,
with the honours of war. Several of these offenders were labourers,
daily employed by Mr. Beckford, and had, the preceding day, dined in his
servants’ hall, and from thence went to join a confederacy to rob their
master.” They were all tried, found guilty and condemned to be
transported for seven years; but, in consideration of their great
suffering from their wounds in prison, the humane judge, sir Richard
Perryn, commuted the punishment to confinement for an indefinite term.
The soldier was not dismissed from his majesty’s service, but suffered
to retire upon half-pay, or pension; and set up a shop in London, which
he denoted a game-factor’s. He dispersed hand-bills in the public
places, in order to get customers, and put one into Mr. Chafin’s hand in
the arch-way leading into Lincoln’s-inn-square. “I immediately
recognised him,” says Mr. Chafin, “as he did me; and he said, that if I
would deal with him, he would use me well, for he had, in times past,
had many hares and pheasants of mine; and he had the assurance to ask
me, if I did not think it a good breeding-season for game!”
* * * * *
_Buck-hunting._
_Buck_-hunting, in former times, was much more followed, and held in
much greater repute, than now. From letters in Mr. Chafin’s possession,
dated in June and July 1681, he infers, that the summers then were much
hotter than in the greater part of the last century. The time of meeting
at Cranbourn Chase in those days seems invariably to have been at four
o’clock in the evening; it was the custom of the sportsmen to take a
slight repast at two o’clock, and to dine at the most fashionable hours
of the present day. Mr. Chafin deemed hunting in an evening well-judged,
and advantageous every way. The deer were at that time upon their legs,
and more easily found; they were empty, and more able to run, and to
show sport; and as the evening advanced, and the dew fell, the scent
gradually improved, and the cool air enabled the horses and the hounds
to recover their wind, and go through their work without injury; whereas
just the reverse of this would be the hunting late in a morning. What
has been mentioned is peculiar to Buck-hunting only.
_Stag_-hunting is in some measure a summer amusement also; but that
chase is generally much too long to be ventured on in an evening. It
would carry the sportsman too far distant from their homes. It is
absolutely necessary, therefore, in pursuing the stag, to have the whole
day before them.
It was customary, in the last century, for sportsmen addicted to the
sport of Buck-hunting, and who regularly followed it, to meet every
season on the 29th day of May, king Charles’s restoration, with
oak-boughs in their hats or caps, to show their loyalty, (velvet caps
were chiefly worn in those days, even by the ladies,) and to hunt young
male deer, in order to enter the young hounds, and to stoop them to
their right game, and to get the older ones in wind and exercise,
preparatory to the commencement of the buck-killing season.
This practice was termed “blooding the hounds;” and the young deer
killed were called “blooding-deer,” and their venison was deemed fit for
an epicure. It was reported, that an hind quarter of this sort of
venison, which had been thoroughly hunted, was once placed on the table
before the celebrated Mr. Quin, at Bath, who declared it to be the
greatest luxury he ever met with, and ate very heartily of it. But this
taste seems not to have been peculiar to Mr. Quin; for persons of high
rank joined in the opinion: and even judges, when on their circuits,
indulged in the same luxury.
The following is an extract from a steward’s old accompt-book, found in
the noble old mansion of Orchard Portman, near Taunton, in Somersetshire
“10th August
1680.
Delivered Sr William, in the
higher Orial, going a hunting
with the Judges £2. 0_s._ 0_d._”
From hence, therefore, it appears, that in those days buck-hunting, for
there could be no other kind of hunting meant, was in so much repute,
and so much delighted in, that even the judges could not refrain from
partaking in it when on their circuits; and it seems that they chose to
hunt their own venison, which they annually received from Orchard park
at the time of the assizes. “I cannot but deem them good judges,” says
Mr. Chafin, “for preferring hunted venison to that which had been shot.”
* * * * *
_Other Sports of Cranbourn Chase._
Besides buck-hunting, which certainly was the principal one, the chase
afforded other rural amusements to our ancestors in former days. “I am
well aware,” Mr. Chafin says, in preparing some notices of them, “that
there are many young persons who are very indifferent and care little
about what was practised by their ancestors, or how they amused
themselves; they are looking forward, and do not choose to look back:
but there may be some not so indifferent, and to whom a relation of the
sports of the field in the last century may not be displeasing.” These
sports, in addition to hunting, were hawking, falconry, and cocking.
Packs of hounds were always kept in the neighbourhood of the chase, and
hunted there in the proper seasons. There were three sorts of animals of
chase besides deer, viz. foxes, hares, and mertincats: the race of the
latter are nearly extinct; their skins were too valuable for them to be
suffered to exist. At that time no hounds were kept and used for any
particular sort of game except the buck-hounds, but they hunted casually
the first that came in their way.
* * * * *
_First Pack of Fox-hounds._
The first real steady pack of fox-hounds established in the western part
of England was by Thomas Fownes, Esq. of Stepleton, in Dorsetshire,
about 1730. They were as handsome, and fully as complete in every
respect, as any of the most celebrated packs of the present day. The
owner was obliged to dispose of them, and they were sold to Mr. Bowes,
in Yorkshire, the father of the late lady Strathmore, at an immense
price. They were taken into Yorkshire by their own attendants, and,
after having been viewed and much admired in their kennel, a day was
fixed for making trial of them in the field, to meet at a famous
hare-cover near. When the huntsman came with his hounds in the morning,
he discovered a great number of sportsmen, who were riding in the cover,
and whipping the furzes as for a hare; he therefore halted, and informed
Mr. Bowes that he was unwilling to throw off his hounds until the
gentlemen had retired, and ceased the slapping of whips, to which his
hounds were not accustomed, and he would engage to find a fox in a few
minutes if there was one there. The gentlemen sportsmen having obeyed
the orders given by Mr. Bowes, the huntsman, taking the wind of the
cover, threw off his hounds, which immediately began to feather, and
soon got upon a drag into the cover, and up to the fox’s kennel, which
went off close before them, and, after a severe burst over a fine
country, was killed, to the great satisfaction of the whole party. They
then returned to the same cover, not one half of it having been drawn,
and very soon found a second fox, exactly in the same manner as before,
which broke cover immediately over the same fine country: but the chase
was much longer; and in the course of it the fox made its way to a
nobleman’s park. It had been customary to stop hounds before they could
enter it, but the best-mounted sportsmen attempted to stay the
Dorsetshire hounds in vain. The dogs topped the highest fences, dashed
through herds of deer and a number of hares, without taking the least
notice of them; and ran in to their fox, and killed him some miles
beyond the park. It was the unanimous opinion of the whole hunt, that it
was the finest run ever known in that country. A collection of
field-money was made for the huntsman much beyond his expectations; and
he returned to Stepleton in better spirits than he left it.
Before this pack was raised in Dorsetshire, the hounds that hunted
Cranbourn Chase, hunted all the animals promiscuously, except the deer,
from which they were necessarily kept steady, otherwise they would not
have been suffered to hunt in the chase at all.
* * * * *
_Origin of Cranbourn Chase._
This royal chase, always called “The King’s Chase,” in the lapse of ages
came into possession of an earl of Salisbury. It is certain that after
one of its eight distinct walks, called Fernditch Walk, was sold to the
earl of Pembroke, the entire remainder of the chase was alienated to
lord Ashley, afterwards earl of Shaftesbury. Alderholt Walk was the
largest and most extensive in the whole Chase; it lies in the three
counties of Hants, Wilts, and Dorset; but the lodge and its
appurtenances is in the parish of Cranbourn, and all the Chase courts
are held at the manor-house there, where was also a prison for offenders
against the Chase laws. Lord Shaftesbury deputed rangers in the
different walks in the year 1670, and afterwards dismembering it,
(though according to old records, it appears to have been dismembered
long before,) by destroying Alderholt Walk; he sold the remainder to Mr.
Freke, of Shroton, in Dorsetshire, from whom it lineally descended to
the present possessor, lord Rivers.
* * * * *
Accounts of Cranbourn Chase can be traced to the æra when king John, or
some other royal personage, had a hunting-seat at Tollard Royal, in the
county of Wilts. Hence the name of “royal” to that parish was certainly
derived. There are vestiges in and about the old palace, which clearly
evince that it was once a royal habitation: and it still bears the name
of “King John’s House.” There are large cypress trees growing before the
house, the relics of grand terraces may be easily traced, and the
remains of a park to which some of them lead. A gate at the end of the
park at the entrance of the Royal Chase, now called “Alarm Gate,” was
the place probably where the horn was blown to call the keepers to their
duty in attending their lord in his sports. There is also a venerable
old wych-elm tree, on the Chase side of the “Alarm Gate,” under which
lord Arundel, the possessor of Tollard Royal, holds a court annually, on
the first Monday in the month of September. A view of the mansion in its
present state, is given in the “Gentleman’s Magazine” for September
1811.
[8] Hutchins’s Dorset. Capper.
* * * * *
~Barley-break.~
Mr. Strutt, the indefatigable historian of the “Sports and Pastimes of
the People of England,” says of _Barley-break_: “The excellency of this
sport seems to have consisted in running well, but I know not its
properties.” Beyond this Mr. Strutt merely cites Dr. Johnson’s quotation
of two lines from sir Philip Sidney, as an authority for the word.
Johnson, limited to a mere dictionary explanation, calls it “a kind of
rural play; a trial of swiftness.”
Sidney, in his description of the rural courtship of Urania by Strephon,
conveys a sufficient idea of “Barley-break.” The shepherd seeks the
society of his mistress wherever he thinks it likely to find her.
Nay ev’n unto her home he oft would go,
Where bold and hurtless many play he tries;
Her parents liking well it should be so,
For simple goodness shined in his eyes:
Then did he make her laugh in spite of woe
So as good thoughts of him in all arise;
While into none doubt of his love did sink,
For not himself to be in love did think.
This “sad shepherd” held himself towards Urania according to the usual
custom and manner of lovers in such cases.
For glad desire, his late embosom’d guest,
Yet but a babe, with milk of sight he nurst:
Desire the more he suckt, more sought the breast
Like dropsy-folk, still drink to be athirst;
Till one fair ev’n an hour ere sun did rest,
Who then in Lion’s cave did enter first,
By neighbors pray’d, she went abroad thereby
At _Barley-break_ her sweet swift foot to try.
Never the earth on his round shoulders bare
A maid train’d up from high or low degree,
That in her doings better could compare
Mirth with respect, few words with courtesie,
A careless comeliness with comely care,
Self-guard with mildness, sport with majesty
Which made her yield to deck this shepherd’s band:
And still, believe me, Strephon was at hand.
Then couples three be straight allotted there,
They of both ends the middle two do fly;
The two that in mid-place, Hell,[9] called were,
Must strive with waiting foot, and watching eye,
To catch of them, and them to Hell to bear,
That they, as well as they, Hell may supply
Like some which seek to salve their blotted name
With other’s blot, till all do taste of shame.
There you may see, soon as the middle two
Do coupled towards either couple make,
They false and fearful do their hands undo,
Brother his brother, friend doth his friend forsake,
Heeding himself, cares not how fellow do,
But of a stranger mutual help doth take:
As perjured cowards in adversity,
With sight of fear, from friends to fremb’d[10] doth fly,