The East Kent. 235 



you to tlie means, or appointing your station so that 

 you may command the best countries. On either of 

 these heads the soldier is treated with scanty 

 liberality ; but, for all that^ he will join the chase 

 to the utmost of his ability wherever he may be — and, 

 truth to tell, if his C. 0. be at all a decent member 

 of society, parade is but seldom allowed to stand in 

 the way. Thus, he is much more likely to be 

 stationed at Canterbury than at Leicester, at Dover 

 than Northampton, or at Shorncliffe than either — and 

 a hunting he must go, be the country good, bad, or 

 indifferent. Or, again, you may have been born to 

 own, or to occupy, a goodly acreage of crops. Your 

 property, it is true, may not pay for your hunting 

 every year ; but it will find you a new stud — and give 

 you something handsome to invest, besides — at least 

 once in seven seasons. At any rate, it is too good 

 to leave ; and certainly it does not take up all your 

 while. During the winter months time would hang 

 sorely, were there not some other object to turn to. 

 What better than foxhunting ? The country gentleman, 

 of course, inherits a love of the hound and the horn, 

 with his patrimony and family traditions. And so the 

 three classes combine to set the chase on its legs, and 

 to keep it there as steadily as the ground will allow ; 

 — making the best they can of the result. While the 

 other two are scattered over the extent of the country 

 the soldier will have his headquarters at one of these 

 chief centres, and at the points which happen to be 

 the most accessible from London. It is, therefore, 

 from Ms point of view that we may mainly take the 

 geography of the East Kent. 



