30 THE HUNTING FIELD 



/'rtrt' alternately, to give general satisfaction, and in the long run 

 you will have a better chance of sport. If you are continually 

 disturbing your best country you may have blank days, and the 

 foxes Vk'ill be very shy ; where there are many earths they will 

 lay at ground. There can be no doubt but it must be more 

 agreeable to hunt a good country always, if you have extent 

 enough for an open season. Provided you cannot hunt the 

 inferior one, so as to give satisfaction, it is more liberal to give 

 it up altogether to some neighbouring pack, or even to some 

 one from a distance, who might be glad to hunt it regularly. 

 The keeping a country, or requiring owners of covers to pre- 

 serve, without hunting it, is too much to expect, and gives 

 people an opportunity of alluding to the story of the dog in 

 the manger." 



Mr. Pryse Pryse, an old Master, summed up the relative 

 duties of himself and field very abl\-, in the following words, 

 at a dinner given hmi by the Goggerdan Hunt, some years 

 since: — "As a Master of Hounds," said he, "I have many 

 things to expect. I have a right to expect a strict preservation 

 of foxes from every one. I have a right to expect old foxes, 

 and also a strict preservation of cubs ; for, without young 

 foxes, the stock cannot be kept up, and blank days will be the 

 result." [Mr. Pryse Pryse would seem to have been hitting at 

 some of the Cottonwool tribe.] 



"On the other hand," continues he, " you have a right to 

 expect from me the most polite attention in the field, and out 

 of the field, to expect a correct announcement of all the meets ; 

 in fact you have a right to expect me to hunt the country, not 

 for my own convenience, but to the satisfaction and amuse- 

 ment of others " 



Some people, we may observe, are very difficult to please, 

 and very unreasonable in their expectations about hunting, 

 especially on the point of hounds going out without due notice. 

 Nothing can be more absurd, for any one who has watched 



