256 STAG-HUNTING RECOLLECTIONS 



the drift which the benefits of Nature should give to the 

 thoughts of people who hunt and stalk, and shoot and fish. 

 I only hope he was not a humbug. 



M. de Ligniville is quite as fond of hunting as Captain 

 Doleful declared himself to be when he took his gods to witness 

 that it was the only thing worth living for. Not to hunt is to 

 be a miserable fellow, and he is always demolishing the objec- 

 tions of an hypothetical faineant who is shirking the rigours 

 of the game. He is much afraid lest the rising generation 

 whom he admonishes in every page may be led away by 

 these specious home-loving gentlemen, and he equips his 

 disciples vdth suitable retorts for times of temptation. Tell 

 the faineants straight out, he cries, that hunting is the way 

 to heaven, and stopping at home to somewhere else. Hunt 

 six days a week if you can ; blow the expense and the waste 

 of tissue. Remember that Xenophon (a prime favourite 

 and authority with M. de Ligniville) lived till he was ninety, 

 and that you will have plenty of leisure to rest yourselves at 

 the proper appointed time, where beyond these voices there 

 is peace.' 



M. de Ligniville's appreciation of English hounds, 

 English hunting, and English ways have been cited in a 

 preceding chapter. He visited England. He tells us how 

 he went there to some extent entangled in preconceptions 

 and prejudices about English hunting, hounds, and hunters. 

 He returned to France in quite a different frame of mind. 



' Cross the Channel,' he says to his chosen audience, the 

 youth of his nation, ' you smart J'oung gentlemen who think 

 you know so much about hunting. If you can manage it, 

 stay in England for a full hunting season. I cannot find 

 you in wits as well as in counsel ; some people, of course, can 



' ' Responded hardimcnt aux fainijants que pendant la vie vous avez con- 

 tentement en vostre travail et qu'apr^s la mort vous reposerez et dormirez du 

 sommeil de I'aix avee Dieu.' 



