CHAPTER XXII 



, CHANGES IN FOX-HUNTING 



The changes of which I write are not in the manner 

 of conducting the pursuit of the fox, or in the " horses, 

 hounds, and the system of kennel," but in the organ- 

 isation and conduct of the affairs of the Hunt. This 

 change has gradually been making itself felt; it has 

 advanced rapidly within the last fifteen years, and 

 recent events must soon force all who wish well to 

 hunting to bestir themselves to meet it. So far back 

 as 1834 " Nimrod " wrote : " We consider it rather 

 inconceivable that, in the present depressed state of 

 land property, either noblemen or private gentlemen 

 should of themselves be expected or permitted to 

 bear all the charge of hunting a country." And he 

 proceeds to quote from a writer in the Neio Sporting 

 Magazine of that year who does not — 



" Anticipate the event of the total abolition of the sport, for it is 

 the favourite sport of Englishmen, and that which a man likes best he 

 will relinquish last. Still, with the exception of countries that boast 

 their Clevelands, their Yarboroughs and Suttons, their Graftons, 

 Beauforts, Eutlands, Fitzwilliams, Segraves, Middletons, and Hare- 

 woods — their great and sporting noblemen, in fact — we feel assured 

 that, unless sometbing be speedily arranged, half the packs in England 



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