MODERN CONDITIONS OF HUNTING 33 



means for an annual pilgrimage to the Midlands. Pos- 

 sibly a more selfish idea was never thought of, let alone 

 published, and no reference would have been made to 

 it had it not been, as we have just stated, a strong 

 piece of evidence as to the real feelings of some who 

 encourage excessive game preservation. 



And in place of the old squires, and their very satis- 

 factory show of game as well as of foxes, we have in the 

 countries referred to the big manor bought by, or let 

 to, men who vie with each other in the size of their bags, 

 and whose chief idea seems to be for each man to go one 

 better than his neighbour. We are fond of pheasant 

 shooting, and fonder still of shooting at driven part- 

 ridges, but no one will ever make us believe that it is 

 sportsmanlike to shoot until two, and sometimes three, 

 guns are red hot, and until one is half deaf even with 

 the small amount of noise which is produced by the 

 modern cartridge. The battue in a rational way is 

 right enough, because driven birds afford more sporting 

 and more difficult shots than birds which are walked 

 up, but when it is reflected that each particular 

 battue gives pleasure to some six or eight people, and 

 that a run with hounds causes as great an amount of 

 pleasure to from ten to twenty times the number, it is 

 shown how very selfish the battue is which involves the 

 continual destruction of all foxes which may stray into 

 its particular neighbourhood. It is all very well for the 

 promoters of these big shoots to pretend to be friendly 

 to the hunt, but as a matter of fact they often totally 

 ignore the hunting interests of any district, and this is 

 continually being done, especially when the proprietor 

 of the shooting is non-resident. 



Unfortunately, too, there are, in many countries, non- 

 resident landlords, as well as non-resident tenants of 

 3 



