THE POPULARITY OF THE CHASE AT THE PRESENT TIME. 7 



hunting is. In fact, the fault now proceeds as much from waiit 

 of thought in a lot of high-spirited young men, all eager to 

 distinguish themselves in a run, as from any other cause. As 

 Tom Hood says, — 



" But evil is wrought from want of thought 

 As well as want of heart." 



This I believe to be truly the case in the hunting-field. 



Bold riding is a great desideratum in any nation, but, as I 

 have somewhere read, though at the moment I cannot call the 

 author of the passage to mind, "Bold riding should have an 

 end and object, and the legitimate end is to enable the rider to 

 see the work of hounds," or words to that effect. That all men 

 cannot take this interest in an equal degree, I admit ; there 

 are some to whom cutting down a friend, or pounding a rival, 

 is as the breath of their nostrils, and to do so, they would 

 ,not only think the spoiling a run a small sacrifice, but the 

 leaping on and maiming a hound or two a trivial affair. As I 

 shall presently show, there is a description of chase in which 

 such spirits can disport themselves to their heart's content; 

 where they are in small danger of doing any serious damage to 

 hounds, or spoiling the sport of, perhaps, a couple of hundred 

 people, who having gone to great expense in the matter 

 of horseflesh, subscriptions, hunting quarters, and so forth, 

 are naturally prone to look with an unfavourable eye on the 

 efforts of some half-dozen or half-score men, who selfishly wish 

 to reap distinction at their expense. In fact racing, or to 

 use the less expressive, though, perhaps, more proper term, 

 riding against each other in the hunting-field is undoubtedly 

 bad form. It is really no test of merit, as the weights and 

 horses are generally very unequal; and in the present day, when 

 steeple-chase meetings cover the face of the earth, at which 

 horses can be matched and weights adjusted to a nicety, there 

 is no excuse for turning the hunting-field from its legitimate 



