68 FOX-HOUND, FOIIEST, AND PRAIRIE. 



to draw together a community, though to a certain extent the}' 

 may attract individuals. Melton has a dozen hunting boxes to 

 let, though quite an average number of men have been flitting 

 backwards and forwards to the hotels and these hunting 

 boxes, if they ever recoup their sanguine owners at all, will 

 probably have to do so through the medium of the town's 

 increased commercial rather than sporting prosperity. But if 

 Melton falls short of what it was, Market Harboro' shows a 

 deficiency still more marked. Oakham has grown more 

 popular, and Grantham in no degree depreciated ; but both 

 these have to go outside the town walls for most of their 

 society. Rugby, again, is a come-and-go quarter making na 

 world of its own ; and the same may be said of Weedon or any 

 other town you may name, where foxhunting constitutes the 

 sole object of visitors or settlers. And yet the hunting-fields 

 of the Shires show no attenuation. On the contrary, they are 

 lustier, and more redolent of life and money, every year. 

 Whence then does everybody come r i The explanation seems 

 to me to point in the direction of increased domesticity on the 

 part of the present generation. They are no less fond of 

 hunting ; but they are more attached to their own hearth. 

 Perhaps they many younger, and have been brought up on 

 improved lines ? As a matter of fact, they prefer to establish 

 their Lares and Penates in a tamely way where there exists 

 just one fellow-sportsman with whom to jog home at night, 

 where chickens and an Alderney cow are the most exciting 

 channels of dissipation, and where the grey-haired rector 

 is the riskiest of company within hail. Has Melton ever 

 done anything that it should be thus comparatively ostra- 

 cised? And how is it that such a change has come over 

 the method of men and women that now each hamlet has a 

 dove's nest, while the big pigeoncote of former days is well-nigh 

 empty. 



Ah, there is comfort in hunting from home, luxury in un- 

 trammelled hours, and freedom in following your own bent, 

 that, though tending possibly to selfishness and leading to old- 



