CHAPTER XLVII 



NOT A HUNTING COUNTRY 

 Boy, I do love that country ! — Love's Labour's Lost. 



A recent writer on sport writes as follows : — 

 " Truth to tell, ours can never be a hunting 

 district. There is a deal of plough, there are many 

 enclosures, and there are such numerous patches of 

 woodland each within a mile or less from the next, 

 that there can never be any chance of a fox leading 

 hounds a decent gallop. Whenever the county 

 hounds do come, they come more with a view of 

 affording a coffee -housing holiday to a mixed 

 throng who know little and care less about the 

 chase, than with any other real object. Pony-carts, 

 bicycles, and foot people make up the greater part 

 of the field. Our woods are drawn in a most 

 perfunctory manner, but generally the Master hardly 

 takes the trouble to do more than run the hounds 

 through some of the coverts, leaving many likely 

 spots, many outlying spinneys, untried, and then 

 trots off about five miles to some more open 

 country, where he has a better chance of getting 

 on terms with ' the little red rover.' The foxes 

 which we know haunt the country, and which we 

 may have viewed frequently on previous days, have 

 an opportunity of saving themselves, and we feel 



