Here is his reply:
'Moor Park, Rickmansworth: January 9, 1883.
'MY dear Henry, - What you said I had told you about snipe-
shooting is quite true, though I think I ought to have
mentioned a space rather nearer the river than Eaton Square.
In the year 1815, when the battle of Waterloo was fought,
there was nothing behind Grosvenor Place but the (-?) fields
- so called, a place something like the Scrubbs, where the
household troops drilled. That part of Grosvenor Place where
the Grosvenor Place houses now stand was occupied by the Lock
Hospital and Chapel, and it ended where the small houses are
now to be found. A little farther, a somewhat tortuous lane
called the King's Road led to Chelsea, and, I think, where
now St. Peter's, Pimlico, was afterwards built. I remember
going to a breakfast at a villa belonging to Lady
Buckinghamshire. The Chelsea Waterworks Company had a sort
of marshy place with canals and osier beds, now, I suppose,
Ebury Street, and here it was that I was permitted to go and
try my hand at snipe-shooting, a special privilege given to
the son of the freeholder.
'The successful fox-hunt terminating in either Bedford or
Russell Square is very strange, but quite appropriate,
commemorated, I suppose, by the statue there erected.
Yours affectionately,
'E.'
The successful 'fox-hunt ' was an event of which I told Lord
Ebury as even more remarkable than his snipe-shooting in
Belgravia. As it is still more indicative of the growth of
London in recent times it may be here recorded.
In connection with Mr. Gladstone's forecasts, I had written
to the last Lord Digby, who was a grandson of my father's,
stating that I had heard - whether from my father or not I
could not say - that he had killed a fox where now is Bedford
Square, with his own hounds.
Lord Digby replied:
'Minterne, Dorset: January 7, 1883.
'My dear Henry, - My grandfather killed a fox with his hounds
either in Bedford or Russell Square. Old Jones, the
huntsman, who died at Holkham when you were a child, was my
informant. I asked my grandfather if it was correct. He
said "Yes" - he had kennels at Epping Place, and hunted the
roodings of Essex, which, he said, was the best scenting-
ground in England.
'Yours affectionately,
'DIGBY.'
(My father was born in 1754.)
Mr. W. S. Gilbert had been a much valued friend of ours
before we lived at Rickmansworth. We had been his guests for
the 'first night' of almost every one of his plays - plays
that may have a thousand imitators, but the speciality of
whose excellence will remain unrivalled and inimitable. His
visits to us introduced him, I think, to the picturesque
country which he has now made his home.
