CHAPTER XI 



SPORT IN THE SHIRES 



Impression of the Newcomer — The Horses — The Hounds — A 

 Bitch Pack — Businesslike Procedure — A Find and a Kill — 

 Another Typical Run — Home. 



The reader who has not been in the Shires before will 

 necessarily wish to know what kind of sport to expect. 

 He will find plenty of descriptions of brilliant runs 

 and wonderful gallops in the newspapers. It is 

 natural perhaps for the writers to magnify their office, 

 but still I think it may be said that in the leading 

 papers the stories of the hunts, as they are written 

 season by season, are very excellent contemporary 

 pictures of hunting. The runs are described in most 

 cases by men who have a lifelong experience of the 

 sport and have taken a more or less active part in 

 the scenes which they endeavour to depict. 



Perhaps the first impression that a meet in Leicester- 

 shire would make on the newcomer would be rather 

 the businesslike character of the men and the horses 

 than the splendour of the scene. Crowds as great 

 may be seen elsewhere ; quite as many people, for 

 instance, in Cheshire and nearly as great a gathering 

 to meet the Duke of Beaufort's hounds. Nor will 

 the turn-out of the establishment and its followers 

 be different from anything that you will see in any 

 well-conducted hunt. Everything is for work and 



not for show. 



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