FOX-HUNTING IN THE SHIRES 21 



country villages near them into suburbs by the build- 

 ing of villas, also the decay of the smaller gentry, the 

 poverty of the farmers and the increase of shooting 

 tenancies are all adverse to hunting in many places, 

 where it has hitherto flourished. Anyway, in the 

 Midlands the crowd is there and must be made the 

 best of by its own members. There is, indeed, only 

 one remedy for those who dislike it, only one way of 

 diminishing the throng, and that is by staying away. 



Elsewhere I shall have occasion to dwell on the 

 necessity of quickness in getting a start and on the 

 dangers of delay if we would not lose the sport we 

 have come out to see, yet the multitude of people bent 

 on attaining the same object constitutes a great diffi- 

 culty in the way of acting on this advice. For, strange 

 to say, however much they may hang back and potter 

 later, every one is in a hurry to make a start. There 

 is a rush, awe-inspiring to those who share in it, but a 

 fine sight in its way, when a whole field of some three 

 or four hundred gallop round a covert. Fortunately 

 their own haste soon solves the difficulty, for four- 

 fifths will be jammed in the first gateway or blocked 

 hopelessly at the nearest gap. An ounce of rashness 

 is then worth a pound of discretion, for two or three 

 big fences and a couple of miles' gallop, and the diffi- 

 culty is over for that run, and possibly for the day. 

 After a time, even the gates are passable if you reach 

 them soon enough, and if hounds run there will not 

 be actually more than half-a-dozen in the next field 

 to them, and half as many again a few hundreds yards 

 behind. A hunting crowd melts away in a wonderful 

 manner when the country is open. A wired district, 

 however, will soon bring them together again, and good, 

 bad, and indifferent riders will once more be choking 

 the gates. 



