FOX-HUNTING AND ITS FUTURE 



The deterioration of hunting manners is, in fact, one 

 of the worst symptoms of latter-day fox-hunting. If 

 the chief cause of that ugly excrescence, overcrowding, 

 can be removed— even by so cumbersome an expedient 

 as "capping" — that expedient may yet have a career. 

 Already the £2 cap has, as I have said, had a very 

 salutary effect in the Warwickshire and Pytchley hunts. 



Among the crowd of over-riders so conspicuous in 

 modern hunting many women are, notoriously, among 

 the worst offenders. The worst examples of hard-rid- 

 ing women seem, in truth, to possess far less even of 

 conscience and of manners than the worst of the over- 

 riding men. That is saying a good deal, yet every 

 person familiar with hunting knows that it is the fact. 

 In one dangerous particular lady riders are far greater 

 sinners than men — that is in the practice of riding far 

 too close to their predecessor at a fence. Several 

 lamentable fatalities during the last few seasons have 

 been caused by this most hateful habit ; and the death 

 of a friend of the writer, under most grievous circum- 

 stances, was attributable directly to the fact that a hard- 

 riding female rode him down at a jump, where his horse 

 had fallen. Everyone taking a fence is entitled to have 

 fair and reasonable leaping room, so that in the event 

 of a fall he may have a chance for his life. Women — 

 the majority of them — seem to be incapable of recog- 

 nising this fact, and terrible accidents have occurred, 

 and will probably occur again, in consequence of their 

 misfeasances. 



But, in addition to barbed wire and overcrowded 

 fields, one other great danger threatens hunting. The 

 pheasant preserver has long been the unavowed enemy 

 of the fox-hunter. There are, of course, some pro- 

 prietors, especially among the more ancient landed 

 families, who have been bred to regard fox-hunting as 



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