CURRANT JELLY.

BY B. T. C.

'Fecundæ leporis sapiens sectaberis armos.'

WHETHER the accomplished satirist who thus wrote of the art, among many other things, of carving a hare was inspired with a gourmet's point of view in selecting the 'wing '—whether, indeed, the latter word may be accepted as a correct translation of the ultimate hereabove quoted, or should, according to our modern ideas, give place to 'thigh '—whether or not the poet participated in the vulgar notion of the day that hares were rather more masculine than feminine, but that they were always good eating, and had no close seasonthese are points on which we might perhaps have cobbled a fair paper some ten years ago in the upper fifth, but which find us now a little past mark of mouth, and, to tell the truth, somewhat more indifferent from day to day. More readily would we speculate as to the probability of the excellent gentleman having kept a few couple of beagles on his Sabine farm, and enjoying an occasional brush with a fox over the wild campagna-timber fences, doubtless, wholly unknown-a feature with regard to which Prince Napoleon and Mr. Knight must rejoice that they live in altered times.

We have often heard it complained that, in the more numerous and fashionable devoteeism accorded to foxhunting, harriers do not quite receive their due share of recognition, and are but inadequately expounded as a large and important branch of the field-sports of Great Britain. Authors of every degree have poured forth prose and verse in the apparently inexhaustible subject of the chase.' The great Nimrod' himself dedicated his best pamphlet, of ‘Quarterly ' fame, under this very title, to the wearers of scarlet—“ all that' (as the auctioneers would say) series of pleasant stories, of which we can now, alas! hope for no more, so amusingly told by Mr. Surtees, so inimitably iilustrated by John Leech, are for the greater part drawn in favour of the M. F. H.-anon a quondam Master of the Pytchley, and a Regius Professor at Cambridge, each in their charming novels make the very cry of foxhounds echo in our ears-while, with Beckford's thoughts in the past school, and Scrutator's in the present, the science of foxhunting' can complain of no dearth of prophets. Yet, with the exception of an 'extraordinarily good day' with, let us say, the Duc d'Aumale or Mr. Everett, how rarely do we see a word in print in the interests of harriers! Not, indeed, that concoctions of this sort are always to be accepted without a margin, or that, on the contrary, their absence denotes that there has come to pass nothing worth telling; but it seems strange that hounds, which now-a-days undoubtedly show by far the greatest amount of sport, in the truest and most legitimate sense of the word hunting, should receive such comparatively slight patronage either at the covert side or in the columns of the sporting journals. Who ever heard, for instance, of a special commissioner being told off to an establishment of currant

jellies, though the readers of Baily' know well enough that these learned and agreeable gentlemen often find their way to foxhunting quarters which, for breeding of hounds, kennel management, general turn-out, and sport in the field, could not hold a candle to many a wellappointed pack of harriers? And is it not the fact, that when we hear or speak of a hunting man' in the ordinary acceptation of the term, we do not intend or understand it-at least few of us would do so as being predicable of any one who only joined in the pursuit of puss?

Yet if we turn to the annual kennel list published by the Field,' we see the list of harriers by no means very greatly in a minority of their more fashionable rivals; while if we include numberless other bona fide packs which send up no field-state,' and are perhaps scarcely heard of twenty miles from home, to say nothing of a host of little-goes all over the country, there appears an array with which nothing can compete in the way of numbers, and with regard to which, this fact being placed beyond dispute, we can but inquire the cause of their occupying so second-rate a position in the scale of venerie. We seem here to have two propositions :—on the one hand, a vast number of people, with a proportionate amount of horses, servants, and all sorts of plant,' representing a considerable quorum of the sporting population of these islands, breeding and drafting their establishments with the greatest care, hunting often three and four days a week, frequently in the most charming countries, under the most favourable circumstances, and with everything done, where the menage is of the first water, in very faultless and tip-top style indeed. And yet so modest a reputation does this species of hunting, with which so many are content, season after season, command, that by no possibility, as it seems to us, could it ever be elevated to the rank of a national pastime, or be placed on even terms with the chase of the fox. Let us suppose-for in these days it is well to anticipate any eventuality-let us suppose that in the disturbance of affairs that would ensue on the accession to power of a more than ordinarily democratic and revolutionary government, some one should carry a bill, being supported by a certain section of the community, to put a stop to the preservation of foxes, or indeed to extirpate them altogether, after the manner of the wolves in former years can we believe that men who have hitherto been accustomed to foxhounds would find themselves satisfied with the sudden substitution of what they now do not care to go near, and that, in fact, hare-hunting would assume the principal position among the fieldsports of the United Kingdom? We trow not. And the reason why it has so little hold upon the mind and affections of going men is, its essential tameness-it has no dash.

We have no fear whatever of being misinterpreted or misunderstood by the most sanguine M. H., or of appearing to cast a slight upon a sport which is conducive to the happiness and enjoyment of an infinity of good men and true. Nay, we can even confidently appeal to them, and ask whether they do not in their inmost hearts

feel that the more they hunt hare, the more they want to hunt fox? Will they not confess to a fondness for an outlyer, and to a thrill of pleasure at a genuine tally? Do they not yearn for something wilder than the finding of a poor creature crouching in her form, the getting her away, if possible, without a view, the frequent chopping, and then, after being fairly settled to the scent, and going right away without a turn for perhaps a mile, everything looking propitious for a good thing-then, horror of horrors! to see her, without rhyme or reason, come lopping back into the very same field with the hounds, or else jumping up in front of them, and spoiling all the nose-work, by making every hound chase his game with no more appearance of ever having run by scent than Master M'Grath or Bab at the Bowster.

'Poor is the triumph of the timid hare.'

And few thistlewippers will disagree with us when we say that the most brilliant thing of the season falls not a little short of that completeness which should be the ambition of every huntsman when the finale takes place, and he sees his hounds run into what has always seemed to us one of the most distressing sights that can be witnessed-a beaten hare.

Much as may be alleged in favour of harrier-craft, it amounts in the main to very little. Men may plume themselves upon possessing it; but even those (and there are many) who are most entitled to do so will acknowledge the utter uncertainty attending, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, a cast for a hare. Perhaps this cannot be fairly understood without watching her running from some favourable hill-top, the not infrequent post of observation of wary hare-hunters; and then as she tacks and twists and turns in the vale below, meshes backwards and forwards in and out of the same field, runs up and down a furrow, and in other ways, as it has been not inaptly termed, makes her works,' it will be difficult to decide whether stupidity or cunning has most to do with these inexplicable antics; but we shall certainly learn to see the hopelessness of attempting to help the hounds to unravel such labyrinths.

The fact is that there is no science in hare-hunting. The only science is of a negative kind, and that is to leave the hounds alone. It is, as we have before remarked, in the absolute hunting qualities of this breed of hounds, in their keenness of nose, their pertinacity and their patience, that their true charm consists—and whether they are bred to be fifteen inches high, or as in some countries where there are stone walls to get over, or stony-hearted fields to get away from, twenty-three, it matters little, so long as they do their work more suo-and if they cannot always find their own game, at least show themselves able to hunt and kill it without aid or interference.

If a flashy, lift-expecting pack of foxhounds is to be denounced, of all things must harriers that are encouraged to get their heads up be the greatest incongruity and burlesque on hunting; and men who love to see hounds work will be more inclined to be wroth with them

for doing so than with the less self-reliant and sagacious foxhound. There are indeed some countries where the conditions are so favourable to harriers that the most fastidious men for straight-going and pace are satisfied-where hounds seldom go out without excellent sport, and where the hares seem only to want to grow their scuts longer to be mistaken for a real greyhound fox. This pleasant but exceptional state of things is not, however, by any means indispensable to the enjoyment of a great deal of sport; and it is good to think of the multitudes of people who, through the medium of harriers, are enabled to see so much hunting at a comparatively small expense, and with little of the complications and troubles that are inseparable from foxhounds. More especially would we beg to recommend it to that class of equestrians for whom the famous Dick Christian used to say (why, we have no idea), that the Rufford Hunt (which is not to be a thing of the past) was particularly suited, namely, the ladies.

It is often urged that harriers are a useful preliminary to a Master of foxhounds, whether he handle the latter himself or not; but, except perhaps for becoming familiar with hounds generally, there is not much in the comparison. The two sorts of hounds are so essentially and widely different, that it can but rarely happen that the same man can throw himself into both with equal facility; and if a huntsman is not part and parcel of his pack, they are better without him.

There is, however, one reason why harriers may be looked upon with gratitude by hunting men. Their popularity with farmers, who are ever ready to see them on their land, and who indeed are in numbers of cases the proprietors of a little cry,' goes far to disprove the unceasing charges brought against the pink of damages to fences and wheat. And if occupiers can welcome the presence of a field of green-coats, who find their hares, run and kill them, often within a radius of a mile, pounding in the course of an ordinary day twenty times over the same ground, they may fairly be expected to tolerate any visitation in the shape of hounds.

THE WARD UNION HUNT.

(Dedicated, by permission, to Mrs. Leonard Morrogh.)

BY G. J. WHYTE-MELVIlle.

THERE are flowers on the earth, there are gems in the sea:
There's the pearl and the ruby-the lily, the rose;

But the emerald green is the jewel for me,

And the shamrock's the dearest of posies that grows.
For the flower and the gem are combined in the sward
That gives pleasure and pace to a run with the Ward.
Oh! the harrier makes music that's sweet to the ear,

And the note of the fox-hound rings home to the brain,

But the sport we love best is a spin with the deer,

O'er the pick of the pasture-the pride of the plain, Where the men of the Hunt, and the men of the sword, Are at work with their spurs to ride up to the Ward. Not a moment to lose if you'd share in the fun,

Of a gate or a gap not a sign to be seen, Ere the dancers are ready the ball has begun

To the tune, if you like it, of Wearing the Green;' For a horse may be grassed, and his rider be floored In a couple of shakes, when they start with the Ward. 'Now loose him!-now lift him! Your soul, what a place!' An embankment between, and a yawner each side. What delivered us over alone was the pace,

Never spare when you're on an engagement' to ride! For the whip must be drawn, and the Hanks must be scored, If you're called on in earnest to live with the Ward. Then forward! The hounds are still fleeting away.

How they drive for a scent, how they press for a view! Now they have it! and strain at the flanks of their prey, As he scuds by Dunshaughlin, and on to Kilrue; While the field are beat off, from the lout to the lord, For the tail of a comet's a joke to the Ward. The boldest are baffled, the best are outpaced;

1

For wreckers and ropes at each fence there's a call. What with riders dismounted, and horses disgraced,

You'd think not a leap was left in us at all.

But these humours your bard hasn't breath to record,
For disasters come thick in a run with the Ward.

Like fairies we whirl by the Fairy-house. See,

They are down in the gripe, and the mare's on the man! But a voice cometh up from the deep, and, says he,

'It's pretendin' ye are! Sure ye're schaming it, Fan!' So we leave them, in hopes they may soon be restored. There's no time to look back in a run with the Ward. At the finish, how few are there left in the game!

And the few that are left are well pleased to be there. But an Irishman rides for the sport, not the fame ;

And it's little he'll trouble, and less that he'll care For the stakes, when the pieces are swept from the board. It's diversion he likes, So he hunts with the Ward. Then success to the Master! More power, and long life! Success to his horses, his hounds, and his men!

And the brightest of days to his fair lady-wife!

May she lead us, and beat us, again and again! Thus from Sorrow we'll borrow all Fate can afford, And with Morrogh to-morrow we'll hunt with the Ward!