COVERS. 139 



manship, gradually progressed to its climacteric, means 

 were resorted to, to enable the sport to be enjoyed 

 entirely in the open, and leave the " dirty woodlands," 

 as they are called, for cub-hunting, or for bye days, 

 when some neighbouring pack may be reached at a 

 more genial fixture. Desirable as a fine open country 

 is for fox-hunting, how often do we see the thing well 

 done, and good sport shown, in many of the pro- 

 vincials, where the nature of the covers and enclosures 

 is just the reverse, and where the natives, from a truly 

 English and laudable desire to spend their incomes at 

 home, and promote the general good of their neighbours, 

 and wishing to enjoy, in the best manner they can, " the 

 goods the gods have provided them," set a far better 

 example to the rising generation, than those debilitated 

 scions of debauchery, who are daily wasting, not only 

 their health, but their exchequers in the support of 

 foreign allurements and frivolities. Although a large 

 woodland cannot very conveniently be dis-afibrested, 

 and converted into a flying country at a year's notice, 

 nor the shades of Whittlebury be metamorphosed by a 

 magic touch, into the far-famed grass grounds of 

 Misterton, yet by proper management and atttention 

 to a very few points, really good sport may be obtained 

 in almost any country, let it be ever so dark and 

 severe, provided the occupiers have spirit and liberality 

 to pursue the following plans. Let bridle-gates, or 

 riding gates as they are sometimes termed, be placed 

 at divers points for the convenience of not only the 

 sportsmen in general, but more especially to enable 

 the men, attendant on the hounds, to get at them quick, 

 and assist them as occasion may require, without the 



