INTRODUCTION xv 



little we must give, but what we ought to afford. If 

 we take down a dozen horses into the Shires, and 

 mean to hunt six days a week, it is plain that we 

 ought to contribute more to the hunts than a man 

 with a much smaller stud. The test of a hunt sub- 

 scription for the conscientious and liberal-minded 

 man is similar to the charitable rule that we should 

 not give what costs us nothing. Every man should 

 make an effort for the sport to which he owes his 

 health and happiness for half the year. The 

 generous is also the wise course, for a judicious and 

 sympathetic liberality strengthens the hands of those 

 long-suffering persons, the master and secretary of 

 the hunt, and increases the popularity of the sport 

 far more than we dream of. In the chapter on Ex- 

 penses I deal with the various legitimate claims on 

 our purses. If I have compiled no budget, if there 

 is no description of a royal road to hunting from 

 Melton on £300 a year, it is because I know that all 

 such attempts would be futile and misleading. I 

 have striven to indicate the broad outlines of the 

 necessary expenditure. Some people, without stingi- 

 ness, will spend half what others do and have more 

 to show for their money. The whole secret of economy 

 in hunting is that we must, if we cannot spend freely, 

 take trouble. Close attention to details, an untiring 

 vigilance to stop leakage in the stable or the house 

 by a careful superintendence, will make a difference 

 of many hundreds in our expenditure. There is, in 

 fact, no royal road to economy any more than there 

 is to learning, and the old definition of genius is cer- 

 tainly true of successful thrift, that it is an infinite 

 capacity for taking pains. 



With regard to the sketches of the hunts, I wish 

 to say that these are not to be taken as histories. 



d 



