NOT A HUNTING COUNTRY 261 



First, let us take the description of this im- 

 possible country. " 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." 

 Begging the question, this last sentence, with a 

 vengeance. I should think I have seen a great 

 deal more hunting than the writer, for I have 

 hunted all over England, and I have no hesitation 

 in saying that some of the best points I have ever 

 seen made were made in countries which exactly 

 answer the description given above. Indeed, " a 

 deal of plough, small enclosures, and much wood- 

 land at short intervals " describes fairly well a 

 considerable proportion of some of the most sport- 

 ing countries in the provinces. I was in such a 

 country the other day, and I may say passim that 

 the Master, a good sportsman, who likes to have 

 his hunting and spend his money at home, felt 

 himself considerably aggrieved at the wholesale 

 condemnation of what I may call rough and wild 

 hunting countries such as I have quoted. I was 

 fortunate in paying my visit on a good scenting 

 day. Hounds found at once, and after one turn 

 round a very large wood, a turn which was 

 evidently the result of his being headed, our fox took 

 a six-mile point, hounds running hard all the time 

 (forty minutes), and had they not changed they 

 must have soon killed. Forty minutes with a 

 second fox was not so straight, but in this respect 

 it would compare favourably with some runs I have 

 seen in what are known as fashionable countries, 

 and that it had a satisfactory result the brush 

 which hangs in front of me whilst I write — the 



