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ened and developed, it may be, by the privations 

 and dissipations of a lifetime, will for the moment be 

 supplanted by a bright, cheerful look approaching- 

 almost to happiness — at least a look more full of 

 interest and astonishment than any other casual cir- 

 cumstance can produce. 



REAL AND IMAGINARY FOLLOWERS. 



While hunting has a singularly fascinating attrac- 

 tion for most people in most circumstances, and is 

 recognised as one of the manliest of sports, yet 

 there are few outdoor amusements more generally 

 abused, because it is taken advantage of, and, in their 

 own way, indulged in by a number of men who 

 have no adequate appreciation for, or real conception 

 of, what thorough and go-ahead hunting means. 

 Thus the general character of the sport is reduced 

 to an artificial level. In fact, only about thirty per 

 cent, of riders who profess to follow hounds ride 

 straight and htmt in the proper sense of the word, 

 and the hunting of the remaining seventy per cent. 

 simply amounts to pulling down fences, spluttering 

 along lanes and highways, dodging from hill top to 

 hill top, and inquiring with an eagerness which is 

 wholly worthy of a better cause the stock hunting 

 question, " Have }'ou seen the hounds .-'" from every 

 person they meet. They will say they are ** Con- 

 founded unlucky!" — "Got thrown out of the run!" 

 "That wretched hire of theirs wouldn't jump!" (lucky 

 for the rider that it did?it), and a hundred and one 



