136 Wild Life in a Southern County. 
amusement. When the hedges are bare of leaves 
the rabbit-burrows are ferreted: the holes can be 
more conveniently approached then, and the frost is 
supposed to give the rabbit a better flavour. 
About Christmas-time, half in joke and half in 
earnest, a small party often agree to shoot as many 
blackbirds as they can, if possible to make up the 
traditional twenty-four for a pie. , The blackbird pie 
is, of course, really an occasion for a social gathering, 
at which cards and music are forthcoming. Though 
blackbirds abound in every hedge, it is by no means 
an easy task to get the required number just when 
wanted. After January the guns are laid aside, 
though some ferreting is still going on. 
The better class of farmers keep hunters, and ride 
constantly to the hounds; so do some of the lesser 
men who ‘make’ hunters, and ride not only for 
pleasure but possible profit from the sale. Hunting 
is, to a considerable extent, a matter of locality. In 
some districts it is the one great winter amusement, 
and almost every farmer who has got a horse rides 
more or less. In others which are not near the 
centres of hunting, it is rather an exception for the 
farmers to go out. On and near the Downs coursing 
hares is much followed. Then towards the spring, 
before the grass begins to grow long, comes the local 
steeplechase—perhaps the most popular gathering of 
the year. It is held near some small town, often 
rather a large village than a town, where it would 
