ii8 HARE-HUNTING AND HARRIERS 



is, in the usual way, credited to the account of England. 

 These figures are surprising. When one remembers 

 how often hare-hunting has been declared to be in its 

 dotage, and how frequently it has been predicted that 

 hares would shortly be extinct, one has, obviously, 

 some matter for reflection. In the year 1879 there 

 were hunting hare in the United Kingdom no more 

 than one hundred and sixty packs of harriers and 

 beagles ; so that, so far from the popularity of hare- 

 hunting having diminished, it is pretty certain that 

 in the last four and twenty years the followers of the 

 timid hare have spread abroad and flourished. There 

 are at the present moment more packs of hounds 

 following hare than there ever were before at any time 

 during the history of the chase in Britain. 



There seem to me to be two chief reasons why hare- 

 hunting has maintained and even augmented its 

 ancient vogue. The first of these is that it is popular 

 among the farmers. Many a sport-loving yeoman 

 and tenant-farmer has been compelled reluctantly 

 to give up fox-hunting, for the plain reason that he 

 cannot afford it. Many a man, whose father, in the 

 good days of agriculture, kept a hunter or two and went 

 out regularly twice or thrice a week, now watches 

 foxhounds from afar off ; he gives them the run of 

 his land and takes down wire fencing ; but for himself 

 he can afford fox-hunting no longer and, with a sigh, 

 he leaves the sport to other and richer, but assuredly not 

 worthier, folk. But with harriers it is different. The 

 farmer, riding out on his rough nag or pony, which 

 would be useless for fox-hunting, is enabled by the 

 very nature of the chase, the ringing tactics of the hare, 

 to see a good deal of the sport, and he goes home 

 refreshed and heartened. It costs him nothing, fields 

 rule small, little damage is done to his fences and 



