ISO THE SPORT OF KINGS 



diminution of hunting accidents. Accidents there 

 would be of course : that is inevitable, but the 

 accident which can be prevented would disappear, 

 and this, after all, is the worst to bear under any 

 circumstances. 



Any one who has had a thirty -years' ex- 

 perience of hunting will, I think, readily admit 

 that there are now more good horsemen riding to 

 hounds than there were a quarter of a century ago. 

 Where then you saw a dozen men going well over 

 a country, now you see from a score to thirty. 

 But unfortunately there are now also more bad 

 horsemen hunting, and to their conduct in the 

 field many accidents could doubtless be traced were 

 the trouble taken to do it. In individual cases no 

 one, however, likes to attempt such a thing, 

 though I often wonder, when I see a bad fall, how 

 some of those who are present can feel themselves 

 quite guiltless in the matter. 



Here is a source of danger. There are many 

 men who, with little knowledge of the sport, 

 and possessed of the merest rudimentary know- 

 ledge of the art of riding, yet are by no means 

 void of ambition and emulation, and though 

 they have the sense to know that they cannot 

 aspire to ride alongside the flyers of the hunt, 

 they think they are quite good enough to beat 

 each other. Jones tries to cut down Robinson, 

 and Smith tries to cut down Jones, and amongst 

 them all Johnson comes to grief. If you want 

 to see how foolishly and recklessly some of 

 these people ride you have only to go out in a 

 dogcart when hounds are at a favourite fixture. 

 Mind, they are all good fellows, they merely 

 err from ignorance, but they err nevertheless. 



