THE HUNTSMAN 59 



but it is matching the vigour, boldness, and cunning 

 of a wily animal with the faculties and sagacities of 

 others ; putting them on fair terms as it were, and 

 trying which has the best of it. Mr. Smith says, in 

 his " Diary of a Huntsman," that there are foxes that 

 can beat any hounds if they have time to prepare 

 themselves, and have a fair start. 



Another recommendation that capping on the 

 death had, was, that it was done at a time when 

 men's hearts were open to the generous impulses — 

 they had just partaken of the highest enjoyment they 

 know, and, when an Englishman's heart is fairly 

 moved, it always finds vent through his pocket-hole. 

 The sportsman was carried away by the enthusiasm 

 of the moment, and the hand went in almost naturally. 

 Let him cool, let the cap be next week, and it will be 

 very like paying a heavy doctor's bill a year after a 

 recovery, though we would gladly have discharged it 

 at the end of the illness. Some people cannot resist 

 capping as it is. Old Pigskin's hand, for instance, 

 dives into his drabs as naturally as can be at the end 

 of a good run, and Piggy's Hberality leads us to say a 

 few words on the tax-gathering style of collecting. In 

 some hunts, busy men, or men who like to take the 

 credit of others' liberality, institute a sort of com- 

 pulsory subscription, levying an equal rate on the 

 man who hunts his half-a-dozen days a season, as 

 upon the man who hunts his four or five days a week, 

 dividing what they get with due importance and 

 perhaps some favouritism. This is as bad, or perhaps 

 worse, than the old half-crown system. It takes a 

 guinea from the man who perhaps would give five, 

 and makes a man pay a guinea to whom five shillings 

 is an object. It puts Piggy and Sir Rasper Smash- 

 gate on an equality as to means. When lecturing 

 Mrs. Forcemeat Cottonwool on her treatment of our 

 Master at dinner, we advised her to give him credit 

 for knowing his stomach better than she did, and so 



