xiv INTRODUCTION 



longer be conducted on these lines is to confess that 

 its decadence is far advanced and that the end is not 

 far off. It may well be believed that the true spirit 

 of the hunting community will prove too strong for 

 any adverse and ignoble influences. Especially will 

 those take comfort who have read the history of fox- 

 hunting carefully. None of the difficulties of fox- 

 hunting except wire are new. As Charles Leadam, 

 the late huntsman of the Meynell, used to say when 

 anything went wrong : " It's all happened before." 

 Hunting has survived many material and social 

 changes and may perhaps continue to be the chief 

 sport of English country residents long after we have 

 passed away and our troubles are forgotten. Hunt- 

 ing men have always been inclined to be laudatores 

 temporis acti ; but again a careful study of the past 

 inclines me to think that the sport, if in some respects 

 different, is quite as good as it was in old times. The 

 hounds are probably better and the huntsmen more 

 intelligent on the average than in the past, while the 

 manners and customs of those who hunt have cer- 

 tainly very much improved. The pictures of " the 

 fox-hunter " in the writers of the eighteenth century, 

 nay, even as late as the days of the author of " Soapy 

 Sponge," certainly would not be accepted even as 

 reasonable caricatures in the present day by those 

 who associate with hunting people. It is impossible 

 to say everything on any subject within the limits 

 of a book like this, but I have tried to avoid anything 

 that might mislead and anything that I have not 

 reason to believe to be a fact. With regard to sub- 

 scription to the hunts, I had intended to give the 

 minimum expected by each hunt, but that could not 

 fail to be misleading, because the proper spirit in 

 which to approach the subject is to consider not how 



