The Editor.
Speight. Rugby.
MRS. BURN.
[FOX HUNTING.]
"My dear young lady, you would enjoy your hunting so much more if you would only watch the hounds!" I once heard a Master of Hounds say to an eager young woman whose only aim and object seemed to be to get on. Such indeed was her anxiety to do this that she was quite oblivious of the fact, she was meanwhile riding the hounds off the line. The M.F.H. quoted being one of the finest huntsmen in England, I have remembered his words. For it is simply wonderful to think of the hundreds upon hundreds of people in Great Britain, who hunt regularly week after week in the season, and who never "watch the hounds!" Talk and chatter when they draw, gallop of course and jump—most probably—when they run, but "know what they are doing?" No.
And yet to anyone who is really fond of hunting, the greatest charm of all is in watching the hounds and in taking an intelligent interest in the hunt itself. Not that this interest is given to all, for crowds come out, some because they can afford it and it is the right thing to do, some to see their friends, and others to ride, and lastly some, not many, to hunt.
These last have generally been "bred to it," as a man would say, and have the love of hunting born in them, and so they are able to enjoy themselves when others do not. For even though the scent be bad, and they "cannot run a yard," these few will take a pleasure in watching hounds really hunt, and will hug themselves with delight as they distinguish old Rhapsody feather up a furrow away from the rest till she can assure herself that it is right, and then with a note like a bell bring all the others flying to her cry, till one after another they pick up the line and proclaim that it is good.