ENTICING LINES OF HUNTING COUNTRY THAT I HAVE EVER SEEN
Neatly trimmed hedges, divided by small fields of old turf, stretched away towards the River Severn. The Berkeley’s huntsman, Michael Stokes, and his whipper-in, Sam Jones, in the distinctive Berkeley livery of mustard yellow, were moving gradually away from us, the Berkeley bitches drawing on just in front of them.
As delectable as the hedges looked, there were hidden traps behind each one. “Whatever you do, get some speed up into these, they are very wide and there’s a ditch behind every one of them. If you don’t, you will end up in one,” warned local farmer Rob Allen, whose land we were on.
Just as the wait was getting agonising, Joint Master and fieldmaster John Evans wheeled his horse round and was off at full gallop. The pent-up energy of the waiting field burst and they followed, a furious cavalcade hot on his heels. I pulled out onto the left wing, where I had seen Allen position himself, picked a spot in the hedge and left the rest to my horse.
“He cleared the wire, the ridiculously wide hedge and the stream behind it”
The first hedge was quickly upon us. My horse, Harold,
