3i6 HARE-HUNTING AND HARRIERS 



deck themselves in verdure uncontaminated, and the 

 wild creatures find their resting-places. Here the 

 hare-hunter will, let us hope, for generations yet to 

 come, pursue his quiet sport, taking his hounds into 

 the field with each succeeding October, and for five 

 months of the year awaking the echoes of hill and 

 moor and valley with the thrilling note of his horn 

 and the inspiring cry of his hounds. 



Fox-hunting as it is now pursued in many localities, 

 has apparently to endure a crisis. There are many 

 signs that this crisis is not long to be delayed. As 

 an admirer of fox-hunting, I can but be concerned 

 with the changes for the worse that have in too many 

 places overtaken this fine sport. In the year 1893 

 there died in Warwickshire an old relative of my own, 

 at the great age of ninety years. She had been bred 

 up all her life among fox-hunters, and was old enough 

 to remember the time when Squire Corbet hunted the 

 whole of the Warwickshire country, north and south. 

 Squire Corbet reigned from 1791 to 1811, one of the 

 most glorious periods of hunting in that shire. I 

 remember well the old print of Mr. Corbet, on his 

 white horse, cheering his hounds out of covert, which 

 used to hang in my aunt's dining-room. 



This old lady lived to see the days of over-crowded 

 fields, of barbed wire, of the decline of the farming 

 interest ; yet the memories of Squire Corbet and his 

 hounds remained fresh in her mind to the end of her 

 life. She was born in 1803, her mind was, to the 

 last, unimpaired ; she remembered well the bitter 

 winter of 1812 and Napoleon's terrible Russian cam- 

 paign ; and from her I drew, from the days of my 

 youth, many a picture of old English country life. 

 Even in my own time, I have seen many changes for 

 the worse in fox-hunting. I can well remember, as 



