SPORT. 



FOX-HUNTING. 



Perhaps no greater anomaly — no more palpable 

 anachronism — exists than fox-hunting in England. Yet 

 it has been called, and is, the " national sport." Why ? 

 Population increases ; the island is filling up fast. 

 The limited area unoccupied by human dwellings, 

 machineries, and locomotive facilities of all kinds is 

 still, in spite of bad seasons, as a rule fertile enough 

 to supply some considerable proportion of the 

 increasing wants of the nation. Every acre worth 

 cultivating, let waste land reclaimers say what they 

 will, is cultivated ; and impoverished landlords and 

 tenants alike are less than ever able to bear the losses 

 inflicted by broken fences, unhinged gates, and over- 



