174 TEN YEARS OF GAME-KEEPING 



trying to serve two. Hunt committees might do 

 worse than establish centres for the production of 

 eggs and the rearing of pheasants. From these 

 they might in some measure make amends for losses 

 by foxes, conditionally upon coverts being reasonably 

 open to hounds, and foxes being found in them. 

 This would be a good way of finding employment 

 for keepers out of place, besides being a sympathetic 

 compliment to the whole brotherhood of keepers. 



There is no insuperable difficulty in the way of 

 making allowance for losses among pheasants, or in 

 compensating for them in kind. The question is, 

 Who is to bear the cost of this tribute to foxes ? 

 Since it is absurdly unjust that men who already 

 pay heavily for their shooting should be so taxed, 

 seeing that they are growing every year more 

 unwilling to bear it, and that it is solely for the 

 benefit of hunting-people that the tax exists at all, 

 it is only reasonable that hunting-people should 

 bear it. The more difficult problem is foxes and 

 partridges. What with rooks, rats, and other 

 vermin, partridges have to contend with quite 

 enough persecution without any attention on the 

 part of foxes. I do not think partridges ever will 

 be reared with the same facility as pheasants ; at 

 any rate, I devoutly hope they will not. There is 

 no practicable way in which losses among partridges 

 could be made good by a sympathetic hunt. Of 

 course, Hungarian birds might be distributed in the 



