82 COVERT-SIDE SKETCHES. 



yet there is always the hope of struggling on into the select few 

 who alone are left at the end of these great performances. 

 Herein fox-hunting has a charm which deer-hunting (turned 

 out) and the drag can never know — that of uncertainty; be- 

 cause, when a deer has been once hunted, you can give a very 

 shrewd guess how far he will go on a certain amount of law, 

 as well as the line he will take. Of course, with a drag, all 

 this is cut and dried, and so the only two kinds of chase which 

 could compete with fox-hunting as a trial of capability in cross- 

 ing a country lose that charm which lends the greatest zest 

 to all sport. Another great advantage I must claim for fox- 

 hunting is that it is essentially a product and outcome of 

 civilization. In fact, until forests were broken up and the land 

 became open and cultivated, hunting, as now carried out, was 

 impossible. As the forests were stubbed, and heaths enclosed, 

 the fox gradually but surely came to the front as a beast of 

 chase, and, so far, has held his own in the most highly culti- 

 vated districts. What effect the extension of steam-cultivation 

 may have on the sport is another matter. I only speak of the 

 case as it stands at present. One result of its general adoption 

 will certainly be to give hounds more room in the plough 

 countries — a fact at which real lovers of hunting will not feel 

 unmitigated sorrow, even should they not be able to go quite as 

 straight as in former days. It has been my lot to hunt in coun- 

 tries of aU sorts and kinds, and much as I have enjoyed myself 

 with fox-hounds in wild, forest-like districts, I must admit that 

 for a continuation the more civilized localities certainly have the 

 advantage, and no small one is it, that on a short winter's day 

 you know where to go to find your game at once. In an open, 

 heathy country, interspersed with bogs and gorse patches, a fox 

 is as likely to lie in one place as another, and you may, unless 

 a tender-nosed hound chances to hit on his drag, draw miles 

 and yet leave your fox behind you at last. Hence long draws 

 in such places often occur ; and there is also another conside- 

 ration, which is, that when your fox is found he has no pai- 



