FOX-HUNTING AND WARFARE 305 



for the equipment and organisation of the volunteer 

 cavalry. To Colonel Bower, of Droxford, in i860, 

 belongs the honour of first training hunting men to 

 act as a corps of mounted riflemen and to occupy 

 ground from point to point across country. He was 

 a prominent member of the Hambledon Hunt, then 

 ruled over by the late Earl Powlett, and was 

 eminently the proper person to judge of the 

 difference between hunting men and trained cavalry 

 soldiers. His idea was only to make the Yeomanry 

 a means of national defence against invasion, as may 

 be gathered from his own words : " When the number 

 of hunting men in Great Britain is considered, all of 

 whom would be ready to turn out to harass the flank 

 of an invader, beyond reach even of his cavalry, 

 some estimate may be formed of the value of this 

 contribution to the plan of defence." The gallant 

 Colonel could hardly have dreamt of such a corps as 

 the Imperial Yeomanry, capable of rendering efficient 

 service on the battlefield, nor probably, with the 

 exception of Lord Chesham, had anybody dreamt of 

 the enrolment of such a corps. When Lord Ches- 

 ham's scheme became definitely settled on a satis- 

 factory basis, I wrote in the columns of the Sporting 

 Life of the 19th of January, 1900 : — 



"The enrolment of the Imperial Yeomanry has 

 proved beyond all doubt that the hunting-field can 

 supply men and horses for the defence of the country, 

 while the zeal of first-flight men to fight for the 

 Queen and Empire, as exhibited by the number of 



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