50 THE BEST SEASON ON RECORD. 



to sjKire seeds and wJieat. The latter it Is easy enough 

 to see and generally to avoid, even with advantage to 

 ourselves. But seeds — which one cannot but be glad to 

 think are now growing on many hundreds of acres in the 

 form of young grass for permanent pasture — these are 

 much less readily discerned, and are apt to be treated 

 with a lamentable want of consideration. Not every 

 hunting-man was bred in a neighbourhood of open fields, 

 or brought up in daily contact with the healthy techni- 

 calities of agriculture. But to whatever sphere he may 

 have been born, he owes it to himself, he owes It equally 

 to bis comrades, and he owes it a hundredfold more to 

 the m.en over whose ground he rides — to stoop to the 

 acquirement of at least the power of distinguishing 

 between the crops he can damage and the hind that will 

 take no harm. Every articled pupil in the craft of fox- 

 hunting should at all events be competent to recognise 

 at a glance wheat, " seeds," and " winter beans " — and 

 having acquired this rudimentary knowledge ought to 

 be prepared to put it in force by avoiding them on every 

 possible occasion. A man may by chance jump into a 

 field of either kind unawares ; but, finding himself there, 

 can at least ride the furrow or cling to the hedgeside, 

 besides (in all unselfishness) deterring others from follow- 

 ing his unlucky example. Wheat is, perhaps, less easily 

 harmed than the other two crops, and many good 

 authorities will even argue that it is altogether Imper- 

 vious to injury from this cause. But farmers at any 

 rate are all more or less susceptible on the point of its 

 being needlessly ridden over — if only on the score of Its 



