I 

 PRIVATE COURSING 113 



by an experienced trainer, trying them before they 

 run in pubHc, entering them for stakes, and under- 

 going — to a certain extent — all the anxieties and 

 worries which are inseparable from the conduct of a 

 public kennel. 



Before treating of public coursing, which is far 

 more largely pursued than the older branch of the 

 sport, I will say something about private coursing, 

 once among the most popular of all country sports, 

 but now almost fallen into decay, and followed only 

 m remote districts where the march of the times has 

 not been very pronounced. 



In the last century, when fox-hunting (or indeed 

 any hunting by scent) was comparatively little known, 

 and only practised in some few favoured parts of the 

 country (I think there w^re not twenty packs of fox- 

 hounds in existence at the beginning of the present 

 century), coursing the hare with greyhounds was very 

 general ; and though the middle of the century saw the 

 gradual springing up of coursing clubs, the old- 

 fashioned country squires were long in joining the 

 ranks of public coursers, and many of them, until a 

 generation or two ago, bred and kept greyhounds, 

 which they used entirely for their own amusement. 

 By degrees they were weaned from private to public 

 coursing ; and with the advent of railways they found 



