48 THE GREYHOUND. 



intervals of the actual pursuit, opportunities of conversa- 

 tion with, our brethren of the leash, and mental improve- 

 ment." 



Again, consider the hare, and in what contrast does the 

 practice of hunting an animal so timid that the quality 

 has caused her to be named Lepus timidus, when turned 

 out of a prison before a crowd, and one in her own chosen 

 form treated as in all coursing I have ever witnessed, and 

 which was recommended by Arrian eighteen centuries 

 ago, and acted on by all sportsmen until this modern in- 

 novation debased the sport to suit men who would be 

 coursers in patent leather boots, and the parasites of sport 

 whose only idea of it is that of a medium for enabling 

 them to become possessed of "unearned increment." 



Arrian wrote : " Let the hare creep away from her form 

 as if unperceived, and recover her presence of mind ; and 

 then, if she be a racer she will prick up her ears and 

 bound away from her seat with long strides ; and the Grey- 

 hounds, having capered about as if they were dancing, will 

 stretch out at full speed after her. And at this time is the 

 spectacle worthy indeed of the pains that must necessarily 

 be bestowed on these dogs." To quote an "Amateur of 

 the Leash," writing in the " Sportsman's Cabinet," 1803, 

 respecting a famous match which did not come off for 

 a thousand guineas, appointed to be run by Colonel Thorn- 

 ton's Major, brother to the celebrated Snowball, when a 

 boxed hare was coursed in a substituted trial, and killed by 

 Major matched against a small bitch : " Such an exhibition 

 might be bearable to a few sporting amateurs; but CQuld 

 he (Major) have found a tongue when he beheld himself 

 brought to run a hare, turned out of a box, in the month 



