HARE-HUNTING 71 



amongst the farmers and landowners, as to the un- 

 popularity of the country amongst the foxes, who 

 never seem to thrive on the cold broads of the eastern 

 coast, though hares abound as, so far as our experience 

 has taught us, they always do in a country where 

 wild fowl are plentiful. 



But East Anglia is far from being the only part of 

 the country devoted to "currant jelly dogs" and "puss 

 'unting." Doubtless, many of our readers have been 

 initiated into hare-hunting while staying at Brighton. 

 As " Brooksby " wrote nearly twenty years ago, there 

 is something harrier-like in the atmosphere of Brighton. 

 Brighton, ever since the days of the Eegency, has been 

 associated with sport, but the sport has never been of 

 a vigorous nature. Thus, hare-hunting seems to suit 

 the Brightonians, for the most ardent lover of harriers 

 could hardly call hare-hunting a vigorous pursuit. It is 

 a good fox-hunting school for boys and girls, and affords 

 exercise for old gentlemen who are no longer strong 

 enough to enjoy the real thing. Moreover, it is a sport 

 without a literature, and the pen of the readiest writer 

 could not make the pulse of his reader beat quicker by 

 an account of harriers, any more than he could forge 

 a romance out of the art of dribbling a ball into a series 

 of little holes in the ground in fewer strokes, than had 

 been known before in the stirring annals of golf. Yet 

 to the jaded Londoner, or to the invalid, a gallop on the 

 Sussex Downs is full of health, even if it lacks excite- 

 ment. Another point in favour of a pack of harriers is 

 that the expense is small in comparison with the 

 expense of a pack of fox-hounds, and so they are often 

 maintained for the amusement of farmers, in which 

 case the stranger should be very careful how he rides 

 over land, or the familiar question, " Why comes this 



