COUNTING THE COST 283 



if he does this an extra day may sometimes be 

 put in. 



It is the long wearying dragging day in which 

 a lot of country is got over and little in the way of 

 sport is seen that tells on the horses, and when a 

 day of this sort is on the wa^^ a wise man with a 

 limited stud will ' gamble ' on to-morrow or the 

 day after and make for home in good time. Then 

 again if a fox is found early in the day and there 

 is a good run the man who is satisfied with his 

 fifty minutes* or an hour's gallop will have his 

 horse ready a day sooner and he will see a better 

 average of sport on the whole than the man who 

 sees each day out to the bitter end. It is of 

 course a difficult subject to generalise on, but I 

 have had a good deal of experience in this direc- 

 tion and that is the conclusion I have come to 

 after considerable thought. 



I think also that a man will see more sport 

 and enjoy it better if he attaches himself to one 

 hunt and follows its fortunes regularly, than he 

 will if he selects the best fixtures of one or two 

 hunts. It is not always the best fixtures that 

 provide the best sport as hunting history shows 

 abundantly, and I remember on one occasion 

 when three famous packs of hounds were at their 

 best fixtures in one week, how I carefully went 

 out on each day and saw no sport whilst another 

 pack on one of these days meeting in some rough 

 woodlands had the run of the season over one of 

 the finest lines in England. 



Little disappointments of this kind will 



