MODERN CONDITIONS OF HUNTING 53 



that it is better to have no danger signals than a short 

 supply, but each and every hunt which sets about the 

 wire question in a business-like manner can ameliorate 

 the nuisance in some degree. 



It may be pointed out that, in a great majority of 

 cases, it is the best plan to treat with the owners of 

 estates or with their land agents, when negotiating 

 about wire. There are, of course, tenant farmers of 

 repute and high standing in their particular districts, 

 who have all such matters in their own hands, and, 

 of course, when wire is used on a grazing farm, and 

 the hunt wishes it to be taken down during the winter 

 months, the matter rests entirely between the tenant 

 farmer and the wire committee or authority of the 

 hunt. But when farms are let on short leases, when 

 tenants are being constantly changed, and when the 

 holdings are small, a little ventilation of the subject 

 with the owner or his agent often does a great deal of 

 good. It is often the case that there is plenty of 

 timber available for restoring old fences and making 

 new ones, and, again, timber can in many districts be 

 bought more cheaply than wire. But if matters are 

 left to the tenant and the agent, and neither of them 

 is a hunting man, wire (being the simplest form of 

 fence) will be decided upon, when a fence has to be 

 renewed or restored, merely because the wishes of the 

 hunt have never been put forward. 



When wire is largely used, and owners, tenants, 

 or both decline to have it removed in the hunting 

 season, then the hunting wicket or the invitation jump 

 may be asked for, and leave to put this into a fence 

 is seldom refused. Both are by no means new, for 

 though wire has not been used for more than a 

 generation, it is about fifteen years since we found 



