Chron_V2_P1
TALES OF MYSTERY, THE MACABRE AND THE UNEXPECTED
THE BADSWORTH CHRONICLES
VOLUME 2 - ISSUE 1 - AUGUST 2006
PAGE 1 OF 3
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More old Hunting Songs and Ballads
With thanks to Nick Onslow for providing the text to this amusing and historical Chronicle
The historical hunting song, if I may so term it, began to come more to the front after the date of the Sinnington old hunt song, and long songs or poems descriptive of famous runs, with more or less sarcastic comments on the principal sportsmen who composed the field, became very numerous. The Hurworth Fox Chase and the Billesdon Coplow day were good specimens of a class of literature which was becoming popular with sportsmen and gradually improving in character as time wore on. It would take up too much space to enter fully into this subject, and, indeed, it is one which might well make a volume in itself, but some of the historical songs have such a bearing on hunting in the olden days that they cannot be passed over altogether. Such a one is "The Badsworth Hunt: Descriptive of an excellent Fox Chace, as performed by the Hounds of Mr. Bright of Badsworth in the year 1730," the whole of which I give, as it seems to be the only account which is in existence of the sport shown by that Master of the Badsworth, though we find his name in old hound lists and in letters about drafts.