190 HARRIERS. 



Brighton cavalry, for horse-hiring at Brighton is the 

 rule, private possession the exception ; nowhere else, 

 except, perhaps, at Oxford, is the custom so universal, 

 and nowhere do such odd, strange people venture to ex- 

 hibit themselves " a-horseback." As Dublin is said to 

 be the car-drivingest, so is Brighton the horse-ridingest 

 city in creation ; and it is this most healthy, mental and 

 physical exercise, with the summer-sea yacht excursions, 

 which constitute the difference and establishes the supe- 

 riority of this marine offshoot of London over any 

 foreign bathing-place. Under French auspices we 

 should have had something infinitely more magnificent, 

 gay, gilded, and luxurious in architecture, in shops, in 

 restaurants, cafes, theatres, and ball-rooms ; but pleasure- 

 boat sails would have been utterly unknown, and the 

 horse-exercise confined to a few daring cavaliers and 

 theatrical ladies. 



It is doubtless the open Downs that originally gave 

 the visitors of Brighton (when it was Brighthelmstone, 

 the little village patronised by the Prince, by " the 

 Burney," and Mrs. Thrale) the habit of constitutional 

 canters to a degree unknown in other pleasure towns ; 

 and the traditional custom has been preserved in the 

 face of miles of brick and stucco. With horses in 

 legions, and Downs at hand, a pack of hounds follows 

 naturally ; hares of a rare stout breed are plentiful ; and 

 the tradesmen have been acute enough to discover that 

 a plentiful and varied supply of hunting facilities is one 

 of the most safe, certain, and profitable attractions they 

 can provide. Cheltenham and Bath has each its stag- 

 hounds; Brighton does better, less expensively, and 

 pleases more people, with two packs of harriers, hunting 

 four days (and, by recent arrangements, a pack of fox- 

 hounds filling up the other two days) of the week ; so 



