THE ANCIEN REGIME 83 



(amusing as it is) seems likely to create some distrust of its being 

 recorded precisely in these details. — Believe me, yours sincerely, 



T. E. Wardale. 



Now is it not annoying to have one's best tale raked so mercilessly 

 by the Higher Criticism ? But we will not be down-hearted ! Our 

 critic accepts the main fact that a hare was hunted on some part of 

 his College precincts, and that the yarn is amusing. The last is 

 enough. No good tale should be sacrificed, even to irresistible 

 criticism. Even if it be demonstrated that King Alfred never 

 entered a neatherd's cottage, and so can never have let the cakes 

 spoil, the tale must never be expunged from children's histories, and 

 though Sir R. Whittington, Knt. and Lord Mayor of London, never 

 had a cat, yet will the tale of the cat continue to be told, and so with 

 the Clare tale day. 



But our critic lays himself open to criticism. His difliculties are 

 a ^priori, that is, based on what a hare is likely to do, and he calls 

 the hare " it " ! Is not that enough ? But there is more. He 

 expects a hunted hare to behave as a sober, betrousered man, whereas 

 she is not merely a she but a super-she. What she will do, where she 

 will go, and how she will efface herself, are matters so mysterious 

 that the incalculable ways of woman are obvious and elementary in 

 comparison. Further, from " internal evidence " of the language 

 (you see I myself know something of the jargon of historical critics), 

 Mr. Cropper's narrative bears the stamp of truth. So far as intention 

 is concerned all beaglers' narratives, seeing they have nothing to do 

 with fishing, are above suspicion, but Mr. Cropper's tale is not 

 merely that of a truthful man, but that of a chronicler who is both 

 an eye-witness and also possessed of a clear and accurate memory. 



Seriously, it is a matter of regret that Dr. Atkinson should have 

 no recollection of the incident, and our critic might have maintained 

 that therefore no such event could have occurred, but this he has not 

 done. It may be that Mr. Cropper has got the wrong tiger, and that 

 it was some other " Don " who protested so vigorously. But every 

 man's mental record is at many points a blank, and this is probably 

 the true solution of the diflUculty. 



