t44 THOtGHTS UPON HUNTING^ 



LETTER X. 



i THOUGHT that I had been writing all this time 

 to a fox-hunter ; and hitherto my Letters have had no other 

 objed. I now receive a letter from 3'ou, full of questions 

 about hare-hunting j to all of which you expedl an answer. 

 I must tell you, at the same time, that, though I kept har- 

 riers many years, it was not my intention, if you had not 

 asked it, to have written on the subje<51;. By inclination 

 I Vv'as never a hare-hunter : I followed this diversion more 

 for air and exercise than for amusement ; and if i could 

 have persuaded myself to ride on the turnpike-road to 

 the three-mile stone, and back again, 1 should have 

 thought that I had had no need of a pa<:k of harriers. — 

 Excuse me, brother hare-hunters! — I mean not to offend; 

 1 speak but relatively to my ov/n particular situation in 

 the country, where hare-hunting is so bad, that it is 

 more extraordinary that 1 should have persevered in it so 

 long, than that I should forsake it now. I respedl hunting, 

 in whatever shape it appears : it is a manly and a whole- 



