FOX-HUNTING TYPES 245 



great interest ; he is usually one of the committee, and 

 often a prominent official connected with the gather- 

 ing, which he nevertheless affects to hold in a certain 

 good-humoured contempt as being not the real thing 

 — "neither flesh, nor fowl, nor good red herring." 



He is often also an indispensable functionary at the 

 Hunt Ball, where he is in great request, though he 

 may not be seen at his best " on the flure," and prob- 

 ably regards dancing as fatal to the safe digestion 

 of his dinner. But he will have a word to say about 

 the supper and the wines, and is indefatigable in 

 seeing that the dowagers shall miss nothing of what 

 he regards as perhaps the most pleasurable part of the 

 evening's entertainment ; later on he will be sure to 

 gather a few friends in the supper-room, when they 

 will be equally sure to drink "Fox-hunting" in some 

 vintage for whose wholesomeness he can vouch. 



For he is a fox-hunter — of a certain type, and not 

 a bad sort of type, either. He is popular with all, 

 and, though he may not do very much in an active 

 way to further the sport, yet he " promotes the 

 harmony of the meeting," and makes no false pre- 

 tences. It was told of a noble M.F.H. of bygone days 

 in the West of England that he gave very startling 

 and original advice to a follower who, when asked 

 " What the devil brought him out ? " replied that he 

 " came out for air and exercise." But I do not think 

 that the type I have been trying to sketch can often 

 be accused of doing any harm, and generally the 

 M.F.H., beginning perhaps by good-humoured tolera- 

 tion of the species, soon finds a very much warmer 

 feeling springing up towards the amiable individual 



