216 THE SPORT OF KINGS 



ruffians," which may be a fine piece of alliterative 

 invective, but is certainly not argument, and the 

 same reverend gentleman went on to say that " no 

 courage was required in riding to hounds, which 

 brought out no good qualities in man, and that all 

 the credit was due to the horse and not his rider." 

 I shall be glad to mount that gentleman on a certain 

 pulling horse I have whenever hounds are in a big 

 drain country, or to procure for him a certain 

 " sticky " horse I rode a few weeks ago, and set 

 him to follow the huntsman in a quick thing. Of 

 course, the opinion of a man who talks such utter 

 bosh as the gentleman in question is of no value, 

 but unfortunately it does harm with the ignorant. 



That the stag suffers no cruelty is patent to 

 the veriest novice who hunts with any well-known 

 pack of staghounds. We hear from the so-called 

 Humanitarians wonderful accounts of the distress 

 of the stag who goes struggling on for miles with 

 heaving flanks, etc. But what are the facts of the 

 case ? The stag is the most cunning of beasts of 

 chase, as any one who has ridden after the Devon 

 and Somerset with his eyes open can tell, and the 

 stag that comes from his carriage " like a gentle- 

 man " is to the full as cunning as his wild relative 

 on the Devonshire and Somersetshire moors. For 

 it is a mistake to look upon these deer as tame. 

 It is the object of those who look after them to 

 molest them as little as possible ; they are fed on 

 the best, and they are never turned out till they 

 are in good hard condition. The powers of en- 

 durance of a stag in this condition are immense, 

 and it may be fairly laid down as an absolute fact 

 that many a good horse will be sobbing at the end 

 of what to the stag in good condition is a mere 



