Great drive and cry
Società Milanese per la Caccia a Cavallo, Scaldasole, Italy
IT was mid-afternoon and hounds were gathered round their huntsman on the maize stubble at the corner of two woods. Horses steamed in the cold winter drizzle and the field chatted happily about the thrills and spills of the last run, while Col Toby Bridge put his horse at the bank back into the trees to look for a stray hound.
It could have been anywhere in England, except that the voices were Italian and we were somewhere south of Milan on the great, flat western plains of the Po valley. The Società Milanese per la Caccia a Cavallo is now the only registered pack of hounds in Italy, and its masters and members have always been keen to make their hunting as close to the traditional style as possible.
We had started the day in a 10th century castle in
