134. HUNTING THE FOX 



If for Frenchmen you read Germans, and for 

 Napoleon you read the Kaiser, you have a strange 

 family likeness to a certain school of thought that 

 made itself heard before the War. Then comes 

 more prophecy : 



For I looked into its pages and I read the book of Fate, 

 And saw Fox-hunting abolished by an order from the State. 



Saw the landlords yield their acres after centuries of wrongs, 

 Cotton lords turn country gentlemen in patriotic throngs ; 

 Queen, religion. State abandoned, and the flags of party 



furled 

 In the government of Cobden and the dotage of the world. 



Nor do the Fox-hunters escape : 



Hark, my merry comrades call me, and Jack Morgan blows 



his horn, 

 I, to whom their foolish pastime is an object of my scorn. 

 Can a sight be more disgusting, more absurd a paradox, 

 Than to see two hundred people riding at a miserable fox ? 

 Will his capture on the morrow any satisfaction bring ? 

 I am shamed through all my nature to have done so flat a 



thing. 

 Weakness to be wroth with weakness ! I'm an idiot for 



my pains. 

 Nature gave to every sportsman an inferior set of brains. 



This last line is masterly, and was described to the 

 writer by a good judge of literature who had never 

 hunted, as the very quintessence of parody on the 

 author of " Locksley Hall." 



It had not been intended to offer comment in 

 these pages on the works of any living author. 



