HUNTING 139 



horses are taught to jump wire,* they learn to gauge 

 the size of the fence by the height of the post, and I 

 have heard of amusing instances when an Australian 

 horse has jumped his rider off by suddenly and un- 

 expectedly leaping over an imaginary fence in perfect 

 form when merely ridden between two posts. 



One occasionally hears methods by which, on a 

 pinch, an ordinary American or English hunter may 

 get safely over a wire fence by putting a handkerchief 

 over the top strand, but I would prefer to leave such 

 tricks to others, and try in some way to get around the 

 wire. I have, on one occasion, jumped four strands 

 of clean barbed wire, but you may be quite sure that 

 I did not do it intentionally. Unfortunately, more 

 and more land is being ruined for hunting, here as well 

 as abroad, by the presence of wire. Although less 

 durable, it is a cheaper fence for the farmer to erect, 

 and is, in his case, quite excusable, but it is out- 

 rageous when wealthy landowners, who live in a 

 hunting community and actually go out with hounds, 

 incase their property with high and impenetrable 

 fences, as is done, for instance, in certain fashionable 

 sections of Long Island. 



Stone walls, as a rule, look smaller than their actual 

 height, but, owing to their solidity of appearance, horses 

 jump them very well. This is also the case with stone 

 walls which have a "rider" or wooden rail on top. 

 Snake fences are jumped as ordinary timber, taking 

 care that one is straight at the panel, and that one 

 avoids, as far as possible, the pointed " forks" where 



* The M. F. H. of the Ashburton Hunt, in New Zealand, wrote: "We 

 think very little of ordinary wire, but a barbed and double — a fence 

 with barbed wire each side of a bank, sometimes six feet apart and four 

 feet high — takes a good lot of jumping." So one might imagine! 



