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THE KINO OF THE FOX llUNTERS.* miht be excused whoon first seeing a
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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enough to express our surprise , that a man who ^ has solemnly devoted himself to the service of Christ should persist in awakening every nnchristian emotioa . in the mirids ^ of those persons who are his particular charge , rather than sacrifice a few gewgaws , and so stne fiis own pride—should do his best , or worst , to damn those whose salvation is his especial commission . But that , we repeat , was not the question before the magistrates . They had nothing ^ todo ^ with the internal dissensions of the Church of England , and indeed had no occasion to treat this as a matter affecting any one sect , except so far as the law provided special punishments for offences against its worship . It is the duty of the magistrate to protect the religious worship of all denominations . He has nothing to do with questions of discipline or Church policy . All he has to do is to punish persons outraging that service . Worse outrages than those committed in StGeorge ' s it is impossible to conceive ,
out-. ra ~ es which could only have been committed by scoundrels whose creed is ruffianism pur et simple , and yet instead of punisnin ~ the blackguards the " worthy magistrate" talked of conciliation . Conciliation indeed ! Between whom ? Such language would haye been fitting , perhaps , if the offenders were parishioners excited into some little disorder by sudden innovations ; but to use it when mischievous rascals were before them was only an encouragement to the rioters . We have the fruits of this most ill-judged lenity in the audacity \ vitli which the rowing is continued . Can nothingbe done to stop this scandal ? Is there no one who can put the whole lot of them down ? Where is Sir Peter LAtrsiE ? We want somebody to emulate his achievements , and put down rector , curates , vestrymen * choristers , fighting men , fanatics , thieves , and blackguards of every other description , who ; together , make the
disputants in this religious controversy . . . . . We are heartily tired of the whole business . When the King or . Prussia compounded his singular state church out of the different Protestant sects , there were some obstinate congregations who would not be harmonious , and insisted upon conducting their . old service . in their old tabernacles . His majesty , however , soon stopped that contumacy by occupying the churches with detachments of soldiers . We can't , perhaps , follow the precedent in this country , and utilize the volunteer corps by . putting them in . possession of St . George ' s , but surely there must be some means ot putting an end to -tills most miserable squabble , in which all parties do their best to burlesque the religion they pretend to believe in .
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A ' -MAIN mignt oe wao , - hunt , mistook it for a band of keepers pursuing a madman , for a runaway regiment , or for a ride of experimental horse breakers . To break throngh biill finches tough as knotted wire—to storm over park palings—to pelt over double i'ails- ^ -to plunge into dykes—he would safely construe only as the acts of madmen . The object of the chase , unaided , he would most probably not see at all . To quietly point out that the men were staunchly pursuing , with danger to themselves , one of the swiftest and most crafty of animals , would perhaps startle him , as it would also to tell him that this sport was one of the main causes that kept English gentlemen so strong , enduring , hardy , and imeffeminate . To all this our Frenchman would at all
probably answer : — " Mafoi , sare , I see it nothing . " If fox hunting has done no more for England than improving our breed of horses ^ and keeping our landlords from becoming absentees , it may claim some privige from the lover of Ills country ; but if we can prove that Melton and Pytcheley were the nurseries of our best cavalry officers , and that the dangers of the chase have done more than anything else to prevent the spread of enervating luxury among our yeomen of England , to strengthen theimerves , to deepen their pluck , and to heighten their powers of endurance , we think that wo show that fox hunting cannot fairly bedespised by the true Englishman . ¦ ., ¦'¦•'¦ ¦ ¦ The life of Mr , A . 8 SHBTON Smith is a faiv . sample of the value of physical training , and of the staiinchness and bull'dog tenacity of
wjlH that reawlt , from a sound mind in a tough body . He has been condemned for wasting- n life in'hunting verniin ; but this is scarcely a just accusation against a man who not only succeeded jn becoming the best horseman of , hia century , but who made discoveries in yacht buibiingy and busied himself in largo tx-ading enterprises in Wales . . Impetuous , irascible , overbearing , yet generous , brave and fpr ? giving , Mv . Asshiwq > n Smwk would never have boon known for anything but a clear hoad and a good constitution , had ho not devoted hia hfu to foy hunting , and become famous by Attaining the rank of fiw » t rider of his ngo . But for this he would have sunk into a gross bullying Squire Wcatern , with great capacity for port , and deep l « . tv «« . * l * i *]<*» rv « . « 4 . iiH . i ! >^ a lvlittst 1 Ai « inn * f % 4 : irnafw irmamtinrya mirl afiirhirllir
tyrannical on the bench . Those superfluous energies that he might hove squandered iu London vice he reserved for hiV favourite sport . In the twelfth century ho would have led the Crosses up a bloody breach at Joppa or 4 ore ; later ho would have broken lancosat Creasy , or turned reaver in the March country ; inithe nineteenth , the brwvo tough man is fox huinter , and becomes king 1 of that guild , as hie would have been firs !; nt'Ag'inoonrt , or louder ng-ninst JTrenoh baybnota at Mulplaquot . l « Yom the day that Master BynoN ' e rival in . love beat in his face in n desperate drawn buttle in the Baton meadows , Tom Smith spews to have resolved , urged by instinct and ambition , to becoincrrhe king
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of the fox hunters . He let other men hold on by their hands ; he at once learned the true viee-like grip of a horse by the thigl ^ and knee -and as for his hand , light as a fly-fisher s , it was never equalled , the inen in scarlet admiringly said , but by the great Cheney 3 he held the reins as if they were skeins of sxlk ; his' left hand was all the martingale lie required , however fierce or flingmgmi-ht be his horse : as for his seat he was one with his steed ^ he fell and rose with it It was always his custom , without dismounting , to leap from the back of his hack to that of his hunter when the groom brought it to him at the covert side . If he fell he never let his horse go , thinking it contemptible to see a bruised man slinking put of a ditch , and calling to every one , " Catch my horse—pray catch
W every contingency he learned to provide with a wise head and lion courage . His great object was , at all risks , to be first , to be the best man—to be in at the death , to excel in what he attempted . His will was inflexible . If he could not get over a big fence , he rode for a fall . " There is no place , " he said ; " one cannot go over with a fall ; all men who are able to keep on should know how to fall" He once rode at a double-rail fence on his untried colt Jack o ' Lantern on purpose to fall . " The very thing ! " he cried when he first saw it , says an eye-witness ; "just the . place to make > my colt a good timber jumper . Shut the gate , and leave us alone . At it went Jack , struck it with his breast , and over rolled lout Smith and his inexperienced nag . # ' . ¦ . " This is the making of the horse , " cried the rider , quite pleased , and remounting . " Shut the gate again , and leave us alone . "
Ao-ain the dauntless pair went at it , this time with tremendous success . From thai day Jack was the first of timber fencers . This Ayas done in cold blood , too ; and we sill know that coldblood courage is as rare as that " two-o ' clock-in-the-morningcourage" that NAPOtEO ^ regretted he found so seldom among even his generals . m ¦ ' . Ifc was not by . any great luxury in horses that Tom bMlTH attained his pig-skin throne . He rode cheap horses , and eccentric horses . jack o'Lantern , for instance—an old blood bay with crooked forelegs ; Screwdriver , a tall dark chesnut , that threw everybody ; and Aystoiv , a yellow bay , with tender back and pigeon toe ? . ' • " ¦ ¦ ' ¦ '¦¦¦ '• - ' _ ¦
-. . Loved by his hounds , feared by his horses , Tom Smith is a fine picture of a man when starting for the chase , all-ablaze in scarlet , on his strong glossy bay , some dark November day , when the drift - clouds slope from the south-west , and the orange leaves are rolling in frightened leaps under the Ted worth elms ; a few hours hence he wifl be no longer the grave , stern , quiet horseman riding . forth , among a crowd of brave men , telling some young beginner never to go fast at his fences , except water ; but he will be riding like a wild huntsman over plough and fallow , skimming ridge and h
furrow like a bird , bursting like a congreve rocket througwiry bull-finch , swishing over brook and hedge , inning or outing over double rails , ready in fact to rnn sword in hand at anything and go anywhere . He may be s \ ll * 'blood and thorns / ' but he will be close to the fox , and will be tliere to toss the red lump of torn fur to the leaping dogs . Away he will go by Wilster wood , straight for Nettletou Hanger , down the steep slope , through the churchyard , up to Faccombe wood , on by Privet , through a corner of Charldown , into a vale below East Woodliay , and on to a farm in the meadows , where they will run in , no check or turn in one liour
and twenty minutes . Nothing stopped Tom : Smith , the king of riders and the emperor of foxhunters . On a hard puller he once leaped a ravine twelve feet deep and twenty-one across . He would have flown at a chalk pit hud it come between him and a fox nearly ready to yield his brush . Once , in Leicestershire , he cleared an ox fonce and hedge ,, besides ditch and back rails—certain death to any one else . Many times the great Skeleton sat watching for Tom Smith in a wet Leicestershire ditch , but he never succeeded in trapping him ; though he often fell eight times a day . He got through dykes where twenty men had been soused , fte drovo over posts and rails which even when broken pther men would not face . Kivery man has his olimax . Tom Smith ' s was in Lincolnshire - there ho made his finest leap . It was on . the banks of . the Fosdyke , a navigable ciwal , crossed by two bridges , the one a bridle , the other a cart bridge , and running sido by side at several
yards distance . At the side of these bridges was a high gate , leading into a high field , and along each side of tliem a low rail , to protect persons while passing . Tom Smith , riding along one of these bridges , found the nearest gate looked , the further one open . He immediately put his horse at" the rails , and jumped across und over the opposite rails on to the other bridge , to the wonder of every one . Superior in the field Tom Smith never allowed . When he was riding 1 to eclipse « rival , he u ^ ed to be hoard through thick hotlges , crashing 1 through bull-ihujhes and rattling over gatos ns if hia horse
had rnn away with him . Once , whoa riding on Rudioal , determined to beat off a farrier who was trying to follow him close , he wont at a hog-backed stylo , with ft tremendous drop and stops loading into a road . Radical cleared itj but the farrier was thrown off , and taken up for 4 end . . ' . ' In spite of this swift fuiy of riding-, so skilful and merciful was Mr . Smith , tlmb though lie never shirked « fimce , ho novoj ; kilkd a horse by hard riding , nor did one ever drop dead under him . His dogs and horsoa loved him . because ho was just , beoanne lie was their ruler , nnd ono who dared do moro than they over dared . Hia fifty hprsea wore all pets ; hia cloys , diroofcly they wero lofc looao from the Honnel of n morning , made to his study window , ana
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o o The JLeadev mdSalmd ^ Analyst . [ March 10 , 1860-
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" ii'O'ti" —¦ . »« — . ¦ ' » hi ( || . n ^ ii > w ^ i . M'wn— ¦¦—w f ¦ ' ¦¦» ... iii ... ^ ... n ¦¦!¦¦¦ -. i ¦! . i . fi ,. Pn ..- " —*>" # jReminiwenoott of tft « lato Thomcc Attthoton Smith , JSffl . By Sir Jonw B . Babdjcibv Wiwwoj 1 , Bartii London : Murray .
The Kino Of The Fox Llunters.* Miht Be Excused Whoon First Seeing A
JbitiUTvUii excused on nrst seeing- a THE KINO OF THE FOX HUNTERS * T ? l T 7 t Tri"fc . T ^ 11 TT \ iT A ~ KT 2 , —1 . 4- 1-v .. n-. r-nt- % ^> n . A + * r \ t *\ ' r \* - \ 4 iT »^ si- coaifin * O
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), March 10, 1860, page 230, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2337/page/10/
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