*

it an unfeeling exercise, derived from our savage ancestors, who hunted at first for food, and consigned the barbarous practice to their posterity for pastime." He notices, also, "the cruelty exercised both on the animals that pursue, and the animals that are pursued; the horse pushed to its last extremity; the hound trained to the chase with savage barbarity; and the wretched fugitive agonizing in the extremity of distress ;"-and in answer to the plea that hunting is a manly exercise, he says, "I beseech you, do not call in argument to defend a pastime which has no alliance with reason, call it a wild passion, a brutal propensity, or any thing that indicates its nature; but to give it any connexion with reason, is making an union between black and white. But it is manly, forsooth, to hunt; manliness, I should suppose, implies some mode of action that becomes a man. Hunting might formerly, for aught I know, have been a manly exercise, when the country was overrun with boars and wolves, and it was a public service to extirpate them. But to honour with the name of manliness the cruel practice of pursuing timid animals to put them to death merely for amusement, is, in my

* See Appendix B.

opinion, perverting the meaning of words. I have certainly no objection to take the lives of animals for food, and grant that if they were suffered to multiply, they would become noxious. What I mean is, that I cannot allow turning the destruction of them into an amusement, and least of all into a clerical amusement. I knew a gentleman who took great delight in knocking down an ox, which he performed with much dexterity, and it was his common amusement to go among the butchers on a slaughtering day, and give two or three of them a shilling a piece, to let him be their substitute in that operation. You call such a man a brute, and he surely was one. But you would find it difficult to show that the circumstance of

riding upon a horse, and bawling after a pack of dogs, makes the amusement less brutal. If hunting be a more genteel species of butchery, it is certainly a more cruel one. The ox receives its death by an instant stroke, whereas the hare is first thrown into convulsions of terror for four or five hours together, and then seized in the midst of its agony, and torn piece-meal by a pack of ravenous bloodhounds." This is good Saxon English. If it is not oratory, it is plain common

sense. Every season exhibits such instances of the barbarous effects of hunting, that "great emprise" and "favourite pastime" of joyous Old England, that, in spite of themselves, must compel the attention of the gayest and most thoughtless of those who take the field; and, after having witnessed them, if only once, for them the plea cannot be set up that they may be reckless of pain, while they are free from the imputation of cruelty. One such appeal made to the sportsman, and made in vain, will prove that, in the next act of barbarity in which he participates, his heart is not only callous but cruel, not only insensible but savage. The cry of a hare, in her last extremity, is almost human. We take the following at random, as they were extracted from the newspapers at the period, and we could accumulate many more:

"THE ESSEX STAG HOUNDS.-These stag hounds met on Tuesday last, about half-way between Dunmow and Thaxsted, and the deer, named Rufus, was turned out in a fine field. After ten minutes' delay he went off at a fine pace, and for fifty-five minutes without a check. In ten minutes the hounds. hit him off again, and

ran for another hour. He then fell exhausted before the hounds, near Castle Hedingham. In a few minutes he died."-April, 1832.

"SURREY STAG HOUNDS.-On the 31st ult. these hounds finished a season of uncommon sport, with a most brilliant run. The field consisted of 180, among whom we noticed the Hon. Mr. Stanley, Captains Head and Brooks, Mr. Tattersall, and others. A favourite stag, Alexander, was turned out, and afforded a chase of four hours and a half. Three horses died during the run, and but very few were in at the taking, which took place at Fetcham. Very large sums were offered for some of the horses, who proved their bottom during the arduous day. The mole, and other rivers, were crossed five or six times; and it was the universal opinion among the sportsmen present, that never, upon any former occasion, had so many fences been topped in one day. The pace over Leatherhead and Mickleham Downs was tremendous."

"A short time since, Lord Viscount Maynard presented to the Essex hunting establishment two stags, which, from the difficulty of catching them in Eton Lodge Park, it was expected would pro

E

duce some excellent sport. Yesterday se'nnight one of these fleet animals was turned down at Cranfield. The chase lasted two hours and twenty minutes, and the spirit of the animal did not appear to have failed; but, whilst running, apparently with redoubled speed, the game dropped suddenly before the hounds, and was found lifeless. A post-mortem examination took place, when it was discovered that death had been occasioned by the bursting of the heart."—Herald, February 16th, 1832.

"HUNTING.-(From a correspondent).—In the course of the winter many gentlemen are induced to visit Brighton, from the pleasure they derive in joining the East Sussex fox hounds, or the Brighton harriers, which throw off frequently in the neighbourhood to a brilliant field. On Monday a hare afforded much sport of a novel description. She was caught in a net, and turned out, and the Brighton harriers put upon the scent, which lay breast high. A hare, when taken from her usual track, runs much faster on strange ground, which was the case in this instance. ran over six miles of ground, through an open country, closely pressed by the hounds, till she

She