10 



HUNTING. 



of these great and merciless hunters shall pass by your habita- 

 tion, bring forth hastily all the refreshment you have in your 

 house, or that you can readily buy or borrow from your neigh- 

 bours ; that you may not be involved in ruin, or even accused 

 of treason.' This refreshing practice is, happily, still much 

 in vogue, though not from the same interested motives. Per- 

 haps the worthy chronicler did not disdain a little to over- 

 colour his picture, after the fashion of sundry good souls of 

 our own day. History, at any rate, hardly bears out the com- 



' Chased the fox as vigorously as he did the French.' 



pbint that these 'di- 

 versions ' weakened 

 the Englishman's 

 arm for war. When 

 Edward III., for ex- 

 ample, was engaged 

 in his French wars, he had always with him in the field sixty 

 couple of stag-hounds and as many harriers, with which he 

 diverted himself when not more sternly engaged a practice 

 followed, we may add, though in less royal fashion, by a still 

 greater conqueror than Edward, for throughout the Peninsula 

 campaign Wellington always kept a pack of hounds at head- 

 quarters, and chased the foxes quite as vigorously and suc- 

 cessfully as he did the French. But there is no doubt that 



