" NEEDS MUST WHEN (SOME ONE) DKIVES." 367 



should it happen to be a good scenting day in a good 

 scenting country, hounds have little to do but chase ; 

 and under such circumstances I wonder what the 

 Frenchman would say of it, who when asked some 

 sixty years since his opinion of one of the (then) 

 good runs, pronounced it une cliasse diabolique. If 

 it was the spirit of a fox in the shape of a Frenchman 

 who gave the above opinion, I give full credit for its 

 being a genuine one. The fact is, it is only going 

 out so late in the day as we do now, that gives the 

 unfortunate varmint a chance, and poor one it is he 

 has on such terms as I describe. If we went out 

 while the dew was still on the ground, he would have 

 no chance at all, if found in such a way, and chased 

 by hounds that can go like race-horses : this renders 

 the training of hunters necessary, and this also 

 renders the numbers necessary that are kept. 



It would be urged by one of the old school, that if 

 a man rode his horses often enough no intermediate 

 days of training would be wanted : and for the mode 

 of hunting in those days, the hunting a horse three 

 days a fortnight or twice a week was, with mere 

 exercise between the days, quite enough for a hunter's 

 condition. But hunting now is racing with hounds 

 before you, so in point of fact it is not the hunter's 

 condition but the form (to use a stable phrase as 

 alluding to condition) of the race-horse that must 

 now be had ; it is not the powers of endurance of 

 several hours of severe exertion that is wanted, it is 

 the power of enduring a racing pace for a burst of 

 four or five miles across a country that is necessary. 

 To enable a horse to do this, if he has to go, we will 

 say, on the Monday, he must now as much be got 

 ready for that day as the race-horse for the day on 



