FOXES.

'THE MORRICES.' BY G. T. LOWTH.

THE Melton meet at Kirby Gate on the first Monday in November, as usual, has been the herald for the commencement of the hunting season of 1871 and 1872-an event scarcely less influential than that of the opening of the Session of Parliament by the Speaker of the House of Commons. Upon a fair estimate of the two congregations of saints and sinners, the average of intellect, including huntsmen and whips, may be said to be in favour of Melton,-in honesty and straight going, Melton is immeasurably in the ascendant; and of gentility, or manners-to adopt the public phraseology of Mr. Tattersall-it is quite certain that ninety per cent. of the Radical Parliament would be blackballed at any of the Melton clubs. It would not be doing justice to foxhunting, as a social institution sanctioned by the fiat of a plebiscite, were it to be treated merely as an amusement, without a corresponding utility. It has its serious not less than its pleasurable phase, and by consentaneous agreement, domestic and foreign, is admitted to form a feature in the national character, the fame of which has gone forth unto all lands. To speak of this pastime as the noble science' is not more than rendering the tribute of justice to a recreation that in its manifold ramifications adds profit to amusement, and assists in providing for the livelihood of the many by bringing into technical existence the labour of those whose position in life makes them dependent, more or less, upon manual employment for their means of daily subsistence. It should be remembered also that the modern style of hunting puts into requisition a far larger number of persons, with their studs and belongings at hotels and at hunting-boxes, than that of an earlier date; so that, assuming a hunting establishment, with its various appurtenances, were to be suppressed in a particular district, a serious injury would be inflicted. by diverting from its accustomed channel the usual stream of capital and labour. Like that river-water, also, which increases in volume as progressing onwards and downwards, in obedience to the law of gravitation, it absorbs in its course the rill, the brook, and the rivulet, flowing from the watersheds of the surrounding country; so does the want that incites to labour for its satisfaction engender other varieties of exertion, the one dependent upon the other, in which consists its utility by the production and reproduction of labour. The nature of the labour is beside the question-whether it be caused by necessity or luxury, otherwise amusement-so long as it be productive of the means of that interchange of capital and labour by which that labour derives its immediate profit. It is the common error of those wiseacres, the philosophical utilitarians, to decry the employment of capital upon amusement, which is said to be non-productive, utterly oblivious of the principle that they themselves establish at the outset of their economy that production' is not meant to be the production of matter, that being the exclusive attri

bute of Omnipotence, but the production of utility, and consequently of value or money, by appropriating and modifying matter already in existence, like hounds and horses, so as to fit it or them to satisfy our wants and contribute to our enjoyment. The circulation of money,—a word derived from the circumstance of silver being coined at Rome in the temple of Juno Moneta, or the admonisher,—is a radiating advantage by which that representative of the crude barter of commodities diffuses through a neighbourhood the comforts that an artificial state of society has shaped and classified for all grades, according to their stern necessities or adventitious requirements. The greater therefore the local circulation of this medium, the more rapid the exchange of capital and labour, the more sterling will be its immediate effects, and he who contributes to, or the pastime that encourages such an accession of the marchandise banale in a district, is an immediate benefactor, as he who would banish such supply by suppressing the source from whence it comes cannot be regarded in other light than that of a foe to the wellbeing of his surroundings, monetary and social. The utilitarians are petulantly averse to permit their theory of economics to be used in any other sense than that of a stern crudity, and flinch when their arguments are turned against themselves in defence of sporting, which they revile as an unprofitable and senseless pursuit.

6 The up and down of it is, sir,' said Civil John,' of Tilbury's Yard, as he looked with a grin at a celebrated sophist riding a fidgety horse in Rotten Row, with a jerking hand and a washball seat, they none of that 'ere lot can ride; no, not e'er a one on 'em ; ' and them's spiteful of them as can.'

A home truth and a homely; for if an utilitarian tailor were accused of being unable to ride, he would resent the same, in defiance of his philosophy, as an indignity. Now this identical fellow of a washball seat had been lavish of censure upon the outlay of six hundred guineas for three couple of foxhounds at Lord Poltimore's sale; yet he considered himself beyond the pale of that same censure when he paid a fabulous price for the first and black-letter edition in folio, with gilt bosses and clasps, of Speed's Chronicles,' and which blackletter, in the chapter of Britaines Nakednes,' contained the rare print omitted in the later editions-of a female tattoed from head to foot, after the fashion of the Ancient Britons. Without the print, he might have had another edition of the work for five pounds. By what standard will Washball' consent to be judged?

And now let us see how the economic principle stands in the case of pheasant versus fox, gun versus hound.

The larger expenditure attending the establishment of foxhounds in the present day, in comparison with that of former times, is the result of the increasing popularity of the pursuit, and the perfection which it has attained by the application of that which may be truly called 'science' in the breed and management of hounds in the kennel and in the field. Harriers are comparatively playthings; and when they make pretension to a rivalry of the nobler chase by sub

stituting a dwarf foxhound for the more legitimate beagle, they neither add to their sport nor their credit, and they fail in attracting to their mild fixtures other than those to whom the severity of riding is not agreeable, either from age or incapacity. In an accredited country, where foxhounds are regarded as an institution belonging and peculiar to the nation, their local advantage is openly acknowledged by the advertisements of houses stating as an additional inducement and enhancement of value the fact of their being situate within the reach of a pack, or more than one pack, of foxhounds, as the case may be. Foxhunting, therefore, becomes an essential adjunct of modern society, ancillary to public amusement and public profit, since those who migrate for the pleasures of the chase are, for the most part, well furnished with that coveted medium that permeates amongst the tradesmen of the district. Then comes the lady element—a most important one. It lures to the covert side many-got up to the nines, with their fancy button and polished boots-strangers in heart and in deed to any cross-country feat, and whose imposture is in a way made manifest by their inability to put on the long-necked spur so that it should drop gracefully, which a workman alone knows how to effect. Nevertheless, there they are, carrying their grist with them, and so far profitable to the labour market; but as to their use, or rather misuse in the hunting field, they might as well carry their grist in a miller's sack behind their saddles. However, they are serviceable to Messrs. Chapman, and others of that clique, who supply their wants, and supply them well, at a short notice, and for a fair consideration not commensurate with the risks. As a matter of course, the lady element is introductory to public breakfasts, luncheons, a free-and-easy five o'clock tea, round-table dinner parties, with shaded argands that shed a bright light on the comestibles, leaving the rest in a pleasing obscurity favourable to petits soins; and then the festivities of the season terminate in a hunt ball, where the maternities mentally recapitulate the onslaught of the campaign, counting up the number of the sick and wounded detrimentals, and expatiating warmly on the conquering charge of the guard dorée of the elders that is to be made complete in Rotten Row. Neither should mention be omitted of the open hand of the foxhunting community, ready at all times in the cause of public charities, whether it be for the relief of the indigent, the extension of hospitals, a subscription to life-boats, or the repair of dilapidated churches. One of the best runs of a former season was after a bazaar, held for the restoration of the church at Melton Mowbray, which brought together a large number of hunting men from distant latitudes. All this keeps the balla-rolling; but it could not roll without a fox-which is, indeed, the identical ball, the very fountain-head of all this revelry. And what kind of reckoning should be made with him who would mar this pleasure, which is shown to be in itself so fruitful of others, by predeterminately and with malice destroying the means from whence those pleasures derive their social occurrence? So much for the fox, and now one word with the pheasant.

That large preserves are the occasion of the employment of many keepers and other incidental outlays of capital beneficial to the immediate locality, may be fairly admitted; but the object, and the gratification of it, are purely and intensely selfish, confined within a narrow compass, and utterly devoid of that open geniality which is the concomitant of the more exciting and generous pastime of foxhunting. Houses may be filled with pleasant people, and gaiety may abound as a preliminary to a battue, where the slaughter can barely be considered as sport, and where the favourite corner, so called hot,' only furnishes a larger number of tame birds for an indiscriminate destruction that is mainly interesting to the keeper and the poulterer. This amusement, like all others, is a matter of taste, and has its prescriptive rights as well as that of hunting, with which no one can, and no one desires, to interfere. But it is not thus with pheasant preservers. The battue and the gun declare war to the fox. Bad as this may be, worse remains behind. The pheasant preserver destroys foxes and denies the fact. He nominally and ostensibly gives a lip support to foxhounds, and connives-by feigning ignorance, which is a lie-at the various modes by which his keeper clears the coverts of the cause of sport to others. Moreover, by the superabundance of game that is bred, fed, and tamed for his pot shooting, he is the actual cause of poaching through the allures held out to the poor man to purvey for the necessities of a starving family. But the most damnifying part of the transaction is the position taken up by one of titular honour, in defiance of every principle of the right by which society is held together and gentlemen ought to be guided. The lapse is too gross and flagrant to need comment, and the bag fox,-which old hounds are careless to hunt, cannot protect the integrity of the unhappy owner of the covert which has been sullied by his own word and his own deed. The imposture of the tame bagman, christened ferox by the keeper and his master, is an hypocrisy that at once adds to and confirms the original error. The crusade now directed against the game laws by the Radicals and Republicans is a visitation upon the pheasant preservers for their dishonesty towards the foxhunters, whom they have treated with injustice, and at all cost, even to the loss of their own character for truth.

These observations have been caused, and are rendered pertinent, by the report in the public journals of a meeting lately held in South Devon, where Mr. Cubitt, who occupied the country in the South Hams, formerly hunted by Sir Henry Seale, signified his intention to resign the mastership of the hounds, from the wholesale destruction of foxes in coverts that had been ceded to him by the owners, with promises of support and the strict preservation of foxes. So far from being preserved, the foxes had been trapped and destroyed in every direction, and the country is, at the present, positively and literally an entire blank. Mr. Cubitt, in forming his pack, was a purchaser at the sale of Lord Poltimore, having given a high price for the hounds at that now memorable sale, and he succeeded in having a kennel

of hounds high-bred, handsome, and effective, which would have shown sport in any of the more favoured shires. The word 'favoured,' in this instance, may be charged with a double signification. Mr. Cubitt offered to make a gift of his establishment to any one who would take the country with the chance of experiencing a fairer treatment than that which has been accorded to him. The appeal was vain. The South Ham Ethiop stands, and will stand, to the colour of his cuticle, and the hounds have left the country. The case is stated plainly, without circumlocution of word, without concealment of thought or misinterpretation of purport; and it is to be regretted that to the north of Dartmoor, by Tamarside, similar animadversion is applicable, where a good moor country, famous for holding scent, has been rendered inoperative by this gross misconduct.

It is pleasing to turn from this chronicle of wrong to the racy pages of a clever work of fiction, of which the reviews have spoken as one of the best, if not the best, of the season, written by Mr. G. T. Lowth, a son of the author of the celebrated Billesdon Coplow Run

The wind at North-east, most forbiddingly keen.' In The 'Morrices; or, the Doubtful Marriage,' occurs the following passage about hunting:

"The fact was," said Mr. Morrice, " that I had no intention ""whatever in doing more than taking a canter with the young "ladies; but when we accidentally had such a good start the fox 3 cc coming out close to us-and then such a rare scent, the hounds 6.66 running almost mute, there was no resisting the opportunity. So ""when we got to the end of the moor-and I must say Marion "" and Anna rode beautifully over that rough ground in the bottom "by the barn, where there are two or three very nasty grips indeed "" and they said they must go back, I thought I would go on for bit. But I found old Wat so full of going, and he pulled at me so hard, that I thought it a pity to disappoint him; and then "I let him go till we came to the check, and then I came home. "That was all."

"All!" exclamimed Captain Wynckly. "You talk of it as if "it had been a mere canter. I only know it was about the best ( 66 twenty minutes I ever rode in my life; and so Frank Morrice "thought too. Didn't you?"

"When my father is on Wat, and there is a scent, it takes a very good man indeed to beat him," said Frank, quietly.

"I never am surprised at gentlemen liking hunting," said Lady "Ashford, "though I have my doubts as to the moral of it. It seems rather cruel when I think of the poor animal in front." "I think so, too," said Lady Underside. "One poor beast with ""twenty dogs after it !"

"I am fond of hunting," said Captain Wynckly, "and therefore 6 66 you may say I am a partial judge in the matter; but really I do "not think, putting aside any partiality for it, that the charge of "cruelty can be maintained."