86 THE ETON COLLEGE HUNT. 



" Mentioning whips, I remember one day, when nearly all the 

 field had gone home after a poor day, we found a hare which 

 took us a two mile point before we checked. When I arrived 

 on the scene I remember the Master saying, ' Congratulations, 

 you may have your whips.' From that day the height of my 

 ambition at Eton was fixed. 



" The War was now in full swing, and the authorities bowed 

 to the demands for economy by demanding that the pack should 

 be disbanded, or, more accurately, sent out to walk. It was not 

 for me to criticise, but it was never quite clear to me how 

 economy was effected, all that happened being that the hounds 

 were overfed individually instead of being economically fed as a 

 pack. 



" During this awful period I often used to walk to the 

 forsaken kennels on Sunday and ' talk hunting ' with Champion, 

 the huntsman. At last the War was over, and before long the 

 survivors of the old field began to talk about reassembling the 

 pack. 



" At first every one seemed against it, though probably this 

 was more fancy than fact. Old Etonians were not silent on our 

 behalf : they signed petitions, wrote letters, and in fact did all 

 they could do. Probably it all helped, and the Head Master met 

 them half-way, and said his decision would rest on the goodwill 

 of the farmers, which he proposed to ascertain by sending a letter 

 to each of those over whose ground we normally hunted. 



''The result of those letters was that 97% of the farmers 

 were not only willing but anxious to have the beagles back. It 

 was not until it fell to my lot to visit these farmers, as 

 representative of the E.C.H., that I quite realised the reason for 

 so much generosity on their part. 



'' The next difficulty was to find a suitable Master. Several 

 enterprising individuals offered their services, and finally a Master 

 was chosen from amongst the few left who had been at all 

 conspicuous in the old field. 



'* Just as things looked brighter, and five couples of old 

 hounds had been collected, we were put in the Rabies area, and 

 only by the individual efforts of my predecessors did we finally 

 get a permit to hunt. The first official hunt was a surprise to 

 every one ; the surprise being the field, it seemed as if all Eton 

 had turned out, in reality about 400. Of these 400 nearly all 

 were what, for want of a better term, I got to know as the 

 'Middle Class.' By this term 'Middle Class' I mean neither 

 the very small nor the very big, and all celebrities were con- 

 spicuous by their absence. This gave me extreme satisfaction, 



