DRIVING 243 



regarded as a factor in improvement, it 

 would be necessary to have access to 

 the records of two estates, the one 

 regularly driven and the other walked in 

 line or shot over dogs, but both under 

 the higher methods of preservation 

 (which may be roughly taken to mean 

 that the whole work is carried out on a 

 system, the nesting operations supervised, 

 assisted, and regulated, and change of 

 blood constantly effected). Comparison 

 between these records would place the 

 matter beyond doubt, but there seems to 

 be no estate fulfilling these conditions 

 on which driving is not the rule. Only 

 a word of warning in this context : some 

 have gone so far as to say that the 

 Holkham totals "settle for ever the 

 question as to the effect of driving upon 

 the totals of a partridge manor " ; 1 the 

 immeasurable good that can be wrought 

 by systematic preservation is beyond 

 all doubt, but for any to expect the 

 adoption of driving in itself to work 



1 The Partridge, Fur and Feather Series, p. 218. 



