208 ORIGIN OF FOX-HUNTING. 



of these, is hunting of the bucke or stag, especially if 

 they he not confined within a park or pale, but having 

 liberty to chuse their waies, which some huntsmen call 

 •' hunting at force.'" When he is at liberty he will break 

 forth his chase into the wincle, sometimes four, five, and 

 six miles foorth right : nay, I have myself followed a 

 stag better than ten miles foorth right from the place of 

 his rousing to the place of his death, besides all his 

 windings, turnings, and cross passages. The time of 

 the year for these chases is from the middle of May to 

 middle of September.' He goes on to say, 'which 

 being of all chases the worthiest, and belonging only 

 Princes and men of best quality, there is no horse too 

 good to be employed in such a service ; yet the horses 

 which are aptest and best to be employed in this chase 

 is the Barbary jennet, or a light-made English gelding, 

 being of a middle stature.' 'But to conclude and come 

 to the chase which is of all chases the best for the pur- 

 pose whereof we are now entreating ; it is the chase of 

 the hare, which is a chase both swift and pleasant, and 

 of long endurance; it is a sport ever readie, equally 

 distributed, as well to the wealthie farmer as the great 

 gentleman. It hath its beginning contrary to the stag 

 and bucke ; for it begins at Michaelmas, when they end, 

 and is out of date after April, when they first come into 

 season.' 



*' This low estimate of the fox, at that period, is home 

 out by a speech of Oliver St. John, to the Long Parlia- 

 ment, against Strafford, quoted by Macaulay, in which 

 he declares — ' Strafford was to be regarded not as a stag 

 or hare, but as a fox, who was to be snared by any 

 means and knocked on the head without pity. ' The 

 same historian relates that red deer were as plentiful on 

 the hills of Hampshire and Gloucestershire, in the 



