CHAPTER III 



SPORTSMAN 



Better to hunt the fields for health unbought. 

 Than fee the doctor for a nauseous draught. 





LL men who are fox-hunters are 

 .^ not sportsmen ; and that some 

 even wish not to be thought so, 

 the following anecdote may 

 prove. In the year 182 — the 

 writer was staying at Melton 

 during the season, with only a 

 short stud of hunters and a hack 

 of his own, besides what he hired. 

 As may be supposed, he never thought of seeing a 

 second run with the hounds the same day. On 

 one occasion, having seen a good fox kiUed, he 

 merely stopped to see the second found, and then 

 went home. Some time during the afternoon he 

 met two men, well known in the hunt, who had 



