FOX-HUNTING IN ENGLAND. 233 



them ; if gates are locked, they are taken off the 

 hinges or broken ; if sheep join the crowd in an 

 enclosure and follow them into the road, no one 

 stops to see that they are returned : we are after 

 the hounds, and sheep must take care of them- 

 selves. I saw one farmer, in an excited manner, 

 open the gates of his kitchen-garden and turn 

 the hounds and twenty horsemen through it as 

 the shortest way to where he had seen the fox 

 go ; his womenfolk eagerly calling " Tally-ho ! " to 

 others who were going wrong. I have never 

 seen a railroad train stopped because of the con- 

 ductor's interest in a passing hunt, but I fancy 

 that is the only thing in England that does not 

 stop when the all-absorbing interest is once awak- 

 ened. 



Whatever may be the effect on material inter- 

 ests, the benefit of this eager, vigorous, outdoor 

 life on the health and morals of the people is most 

 unmistakable. Such a race of handsome, hale, 

 straight-limbed, honest, and simple-hearted men 

 can nowhere else be found as in the wide class that 

 passes as much of every winter as is possible in 



