8 The Hunting Countries of England. 



THE SOUTHDOWN.* 



The Londoner may fix upon many a worse quarter 

 whence to enjoy his two or three days hunting in the 

 week than Brighton — little as we are accustomed to 

 associate that tripper's Paradise with vigorous field- 

 sports. 'Tis of foxhunting, of course, we are about 

 to speak ; for, while in no way holding with Mr. 

 Jorrocks' graphically-expressed contempt for ^'^ cur- 

 rant-jelly dogs " — on the contrary, believing in them 

 heartily as the young foxhunter's best instructors — we 

 hold harehunting to be a sport without a literature. 

 '' Puss 'unting '' — once more to borrow a phrase out 

 of the mouth of the immortal one — is not a thrilling 

 pursuit in the abstract. Even the chronicle of a fine 

 run necessarily reads about as exciting as those 

 mysterious records which reach us now and again from 

 St. Andrews or Westward Ho — where Jamie Junr. 

 has dribbled a ball in and out of a series of little holes 

 in the ground, in fewer strokes than on any previous 

 occasion in the stirring annals of golf. There may be 

 something harrier-like in the atmosphere of Brighton 

 — and much that is creditable in the connection. But 



* Vide Stauforcl's " Hunting Map," Sheet 22, and Hobson's 

 Foxhunting Atlas. 



