SPORT of £i,ioo per annum is guaranteed the master, together with kennels, stables, and hunt servants' cottages rent free, and a poultry fund. In that part of Kent which is now adjacent to London or actually part of it, two or three packs of hounds existed in early times. During the last decade of the 1793, at which time, as already mentioned, packs were established, or in being, at Bromley and Sydenham. When Sir Percival Dyke's conne.xion with the country came to an end in 1834, ^ Mr. Waring, who then kept a pack of harriers in the district, bought some of his foxhounds and hunted both fox and hare for a few eighteenth century there was fox-hunting seasons. About the year 1836 Mr. Forrest in the Bromley portion of the county, and there was another pack which was kennelled at Sydenham, and hunted what we might now call the Crystal Palace side of the country. On the Bromley side Sir John Dixon Dyke of Horeham, baronet, held sway in the last appeared upon the scene and established kennels with a fresh pack of hounds at Green- hithe, and here it would seem that the West Kent began a new lease of life about which particulars are almost entirely wanting. What became of Mr. Waring's pack nobody quarter of the eighteenth century, and was knows, and it is doubtful whether his hunt succeeded by other members of the same could properly be called the West Kent at all family, who are credited with having hunted the country up till about the year 1830, at which period the name of the West Kent Hunt first appears. It would seem, however, that Sir John Dyke's pack was actually given up some time before this, for his eldest son, Sir Thomas Dyke, fourth baronet, is spoken of ^ as having started a fresh pack of dwarf hounds about this period, his custom being to hunt fox in the spring, and hare during the earlier part of the season. After Sir Thomas Dyke came his brother Sir Percival Hart Dyke, fifth baronet. Mr. Forrest apparently hunted hounds until 1844, although no details of his master- ship are to be discovered, and the next authentic master of whom we hear is Mr. Tom Colyer, who founded yet another pack with kennels at Milton near Gravesend. Mr. Colyer's term of office lasted until 1856, when without any previous warning or for any apparent reason he disappeared in the middle of the season, and was never seen again. During his mastership he had done a great deal for the country, and had estab- lished a good pack by purchases from the It appears, therefore, that not only had Sir kennels of Mr. Selby-Lowndes, of the Whad John Dyke's pack been dispersed, but also don Chase, and from Sir Richard Sutton's that of Sir Thomas. Sir Percival gave up his pack. He always hunted hounds himself pack in or about the year 1834, Richard Hills and showed some really good sport, although having acted as huntsman both to him and he did not by any means hunt the whole of to Sir Thomas. These are some of the names connected with hunting in West Kent up to about the time when the present hunt began to be known by its existing title ; but fox-hunt- ing in Kent had existed long before the establishment of the Bromley pack, and one lot of hounds at least went farther afield than either of the packs kennelled at Bromley or Sydenham. This was the old-established hunt founded by the famous John Warde - of Squerries, who had kennels at Westerham in the year 1776. No one else seems to have had a share of the West Kent country at this time, and Mr. John Warde hunted the whole of it up to 1 Foxhounds of Great Britain and Ireland. 2 John Warde's name is, of course, famous in many hunting circles outside Kent, for in 1797 we find him with the Pytchley, where he remained until 1808, and with the New Forest from the latter year to 1 8 14. Afterwards he went to the Craven, and stayed with them until 1825, so that altogether he was a master of hounds for half a century, with only one break of four seasons. the available country. His foxes are said to have had a particular affection for Surrey and many of his best runs were in that direction from the Pol Hill coverts. On Mr. Colyer's sudden disappearance the Honourable Ralph Pelham Nevill, of whom we shall hear again presenth', took over the pack for the remainder of the season, and thus saved the hunt from a remarkably awkward situation. At the end of the season Mr. Colyer's pack was put up to auction, part of it being bought by Mr. Armstrong and Mr. Wingfield Stratford, and the remainder sold to Mr. Tailby. New kennels were built at Betsham, Southfleet, where Mr. Armstrong lived, and drafts were pur- chased from Mr. Nun's, Mr. Cawston's, and the Oakley kennels. Mr. Armstrong and Mr. Stratford hunted the country as joint masters for a season or so, when the latter retired, and a year later, in 1858, Mr. Armstrong sold his hounds, which meanwhile had been supplemented by a draft from Mr. Farquharson's. Mr. Wingfield Stratford now purchased 4S3
