SOME ENGLISH COURSING CLUBS 227 



low ground is reached on the other side of Money Bunt, a 

 goodly array of carriages, bearing their freights of Hampshire 

 ladies, will have put in an appearance, and when the good 

 things, which are spread out on a table in the stack-yard of the 

 farm where the luncheon halt is made, are tackled, it will be 

 found that the scene savours more of a picnic than anything 

 else. As the afternoon wears on the ' crowd J is also increased 

 by numerous horsemen from adjacent Danebury, but the 

 attendance is never large, and the rowdy element at all times 

 conspicuous by its absence. 



The best of the sport is generally forthcoming from a beat 

 along the valley, where turnips are driven on to grass in most 

 systematic and clever fashion. The beat is not very wide, but 

 is flanked on either side with horsemen, and the boys employed 

 carry a long rope, which they keep dropping on to the tops 

 of the turnips in order to prevent hares breaking back. The 

 effect is first-rate, and though it is a difficult matter to conceal 

 the slipper hereabouts, the quarry is easily sent where he can 

 reach it. Hare after hare is * used ' in the low ground, and 

 hare after hare clears her pursuers as the hill-side is reached, 

 only to go right away on the steep ascent and gain the covert 

 far in advance of the greyhounds. I have seen course after 

 course from this low ground when the points scored would tot 

 up to seventy or eighty, could anyone keep count, and not 

 many years ago two stakes had to be divided after having been 

 once run down, not a single hound being fit to go to slips 

 again ! 



The stock of hares, too, is large enough for a meeting of four 

 times the dimensions, and some three or four years ago Mr. 

 East told me that 300 had been shot in one drive, in the pre- 

 ceding year, and after the coursing had taken place. 



The second meeting of the club is generally held about a 

 month after the first, and now Amesbury is the venue, the old 

 place having been once more requisitioned after a spell of 

 Newmarket. Another Produce Stake is run off at this fixture, 

 but the chief event is the Craven Cup for all ages, and the first 



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