CHAPTER I 



THE MODERN SCHOOL OF FOX-HUNTING 



The old style — "Capping " — Sporting writers and Masters 

 of Hounds — Financial results of " capping " — Expenses of 

 the Master — Shooting-tenants and fox-hunting — Con- 

 flicting interests — Gamekeepers — Views of Mr. Reginald 

 Herbert — Letter from a gamekeeper — Ladies in the 

 hunting-field — Riding schools for ladies — The late 

 Empress of Austria — Ladies bicycling to meets — Cross- 

 country riding in the army — German and Russian 

 military hunts — Hunting-men in war — Attitude of the 

 War Office. 



Tempora mutantur. The old order changeth in fox- 

 hunting as it doth in every other branch of sport. 

 Even within my own recollection, which only extends 

 back to 1870, the hunting-field was regarded as a social, 

 sporting, agricultural club. In many instances the 

 hunting-field presented the only opportunity that we 

 possessed of holding intercourse with farmers, who 

 leased land at a distance from our own residence. 

 Furthermore, in those days the hunting-field afforded 

 a means of communication between the large land- 

 owners. We were all tainted with the same brush, 

 namely, the brush of the fox, and we were proud when 

 we were baptized with the blood from the brush. Not 

 that the blood was can de Cologne by any means from 



A 



