132 i^ttJtng to filouutis;. 



that of themselves and others as Ues within their 

 power. The rides may be deep, and probably are; 

 your beautiful toilet may, and possibly will, get 

 soiled, and your horse, too, have a little of the gas 

 taken out of him by floundering through a bog here 

 and there ; but what have you come out for ? I will 

 conclude "Sport ;" and to such only as are, or would 

 be, sportsmen do I address these remarks. 



Very well, then, let us suppose that you, like 

 the majority of us, have but one horse out, and 

 that you are also no less humane than you are keen. 

 Answer me then, if you please, these straight-forward 

 questions : Would you not rather pound him up and 

 down this deep woodland, say for some fifteen min- 

 utes, and, subsequently, by having done so, get well 

 away with hounds, and have a right good gallop after 

 a bold and widannted fox, and then (if advisability so 

 dictated) go home satisfied ? or would you rather, 

 by dodging about outside the covert to avoid the 

 temporary inconvenience of encountering its sticky 

 ridings, spoil (as you or some other individual acting 

 similarly are almost sure to do) the sport you have 

 nominally come out to see, by heading back or other- 

 wise preventing the fox from making his intended 

 point ? Even should he succeed ai length in breaking 

 covert at all, and you personally have the good fortune 

 to get away with hounds, recollect that the fox which 



