308 "JOVIAL HUNTSMEN": 



lads get together to chaif and, " buck " about their 

 ponies and their riding, and to exchange school chat ; 

 but there will be always one or two who make their 

 way straight to the hounds, and, never taking their 

 eyes off the pack, are soon engaged in confidential 

 chat with the Hunt servants, who, though they may 

 mistrust the heels of the ponies, are invariably de- 

 lighted with the lads who show interest in hounds, 

 and are most good-natured and communicative. These 

 boys we shall find staying out to the bitter end, 

 having forgotten all about the Christmas cakes and 

 good things at home, and, though they may not be all 

 great riders, are the makings of the sportsmen who 

 come out to see hounds hunt the fox. 



Two days a week are, I think, sufficient for any 

 schoolboy, and the distance from home should never 

 be too great. It is the long ride back in the dark 

 that tires and dims the previous pleasures of the day. 

 Of course no one is tired, or admits to fatigue, after 

 a " great run," but when that comes off a day or two 

 should intervene in order that it may be fully digested. 

 Schoolboys work twice as well when they go back 

 if they confess to having a real good time during the 

 holidays, so the pedagogues tell us ; and surely no 

 boys have such undiluted happiness as those who can 

 ride and go hunting. 



All boys, of course, do not care about hunting ; some 

 prefer the gun, and deem a day's ferreting the height 

 of bliss ; but the lads who hunt I also see blazing 

 away at the rabbits and wood-pigeons ; and, apart 

 from the ride they have — which is so good for every 

 one — the society of many of their fellow-creatures 



