194 RIDING 



sporting instincts, and in 1874 a regular pack was formed. 

 There are now eleven packs of hounds in New Zealand, but 

 since the white man on his arrival found no four-footed 

 creature other than a small rat, and the sheep farmers stoutly 

 resist the introduction of any flesh-eating animal (except 

 stoats), it is necessary to have recourse to the timid hare. 

 These hares are stout, straight goers ; with a good scent and 

 no checks they usually give a run of from twenty to thirty 

 minutes, during which time they go six miles, but twice last 

 year (1890) the Ashburton hounds had runs of forty minutes, 

 with hardly a check, and as near as could be calculated got over 

 twelve miles of country. These hares when killed were very 

 fine ; neither ringed, but went straight away with a good gallop- 

 ing scent ; their weight was estimated at fully 12 Ib. Hares 

 shot in this district average 10 Ib. in weight, and many weigh 

 up to 12, 12^, and even 13 Ib. Quite the most noticeable 

 feature in New Zealand hunting is the wire fencing, and the 

 manner in which the sport is carried on despite this supposed 

 insurmountable obstacle. 



In all new countries the barbed wire, which is increasingly 

 coming into use in England, is found to be at once the cheapest 

 and most effectual fence against horned stock. In New 

 Zealand it is used from one end to the other of the colony ; 

 for though in the bush-covered districts, where the timber has 

 had to be felled, burnt, and cleared, it has been found inex- 

 pensive to utilise part of it for fencing, on the Canterbury 

 plains, where there is no bush, wire is by far the most com- 

 monly employed. 



It is precisely in this wire district that hunting chiefly 

 flourishes. Many of the settlers are the younger sons of 

 English country gentlemen, and one pack is hunted by an 

 ardent sportsman, the son and heir of a well-known owner of 

 racehorses in England. The country, moreover, is for the most 

 part flat, and the terrible hills and gullies which characterise 

 New Zealand scenery are absent from the district round 

 Canterbury. 



