Fox hunting

At once the list'ning pack asunder spread,
With tail erect, and with inquiring head
  —Henry Brooke

Fox hunting is a traditional activity involving the tracking, chase and, if caught, the killing of a fox, normally a red fox, by trained foxhounds or other scent hounds. A group of unarmed followers, led by a "master of foxhounds" (or "master of hounds"), follow the hounds on foot or on horseback.

Quotes

• The Field is a most agreeable Coffee-house, and there is more real society to be met with there than in any other situation of life. It links all classes together, from the Peer to the Peasant. It is the English man’s peculiar privilege. It is not to he found in any other part of the globe, but in England's true land of liberty—and may it flourish to the end of time!!
  • Robert Hawkes, The Meynellian Science (1808)

• One knows so well the popular idea of health. The English country gentleman galloping after a fox—the unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable.
  • Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance (1893), Act 1

• Of all things in this world, Fox-hunting is the most difficult thing to explain to those who know nothing about it.
  • Lord Willoughby de Broke, The Sport of our Ancestors (1921)

• It was quite by chance that I should be trotting down a Cotswold lane on a friend's old pony when the uniformed centaurs came galloping past.
  • Roger Scruton, "In for a hound...", The Guardian (28 November 2004)

• It is difficult for many people today to understand how you can be bound by a code of honour and sympathy to an animal that you are intending to kill; but this is exactly what was once understood by chivalry and it is perhaps a function of sport to cultivate the spirit of chivalry in those who engage in it.
  • Roger Scruton, "In for a hound...", The Guardian (28 November 2004)

• A machine with only two products:
  Dog-shit and dead foxes.
  • Ted Hughes, "Foxhunt"
  • Moon-Bells and Other Poems (Faber & Faber, 1978)

Verse

• Trueman, whom for sagacious nose we hail
  The chief, first touched the scarce-distinguished gale;
  His tongue was doubtful, and no hound replies:
  ‘Haux!—wind him!—haux!’ the tuneful huntsman cries.
  At once the list'ning pack asunder spread,
  With tail erect, and with inquiring head:
  With busy nostrils they foretaste their prey,
  And snuff the lawn-impearling dews away.
  Now here, now there, they chop upon the scent,
  Their tongues in undulating ether spent:
  More joyous now, and louder by degrees,
  Warm and more warm they catch the coming breeze.
  Now with full symphony they jointly hail
  The welcome tidings of a surer gale;
  Along the vale they pour the swelling note,
  Their ears and dewlaps on the morning float.
  How vainly art aspires by rival sounds
  To match the native melody of hounds!
  Now lightly o'er opposing walls we bound,
  Clear the broad trench, and top the rising mound:
  No stop, no time for respite or recess—
  On, and still on, fox, dogs, and horses press.
  But Reynard, hotly pushed, and close pursued,
  Yet fruitful in expedients to elude,
  When to the bourn's refreshing bank he came
  Had plunged all reeking in the friendly stream.
  The chopfall'n hounds meantime are heard no more,
  But silent range along the winding shore.
  Hopeless alike the hunters lag behind,
  And give all thoughts of Reynard to the wind,
  All, save one wily rival of his art,
  Who vows unpitying vengeance ere they part.
  Along the coast his watchful course he bent,
  Careful to catch and wind the thwarting scent
  And last, to make his boastful promise good,
  Entered the precincts of the fatal wood.
  There through the gloom he leads one hopeless train,
  And cheers the long-desponding pack in vain;
  Till Ringwood first the faint effluvia caught,
  And with loud tongue reformed their old default.
  Here had the felon earthed: with many a hound
  And many a horse we gird his hold around:
  The hounds 'fore Heav'n their accusation spread,
  And cry for justice on his caitiff head.
  • Henry Brooke, "The Fox Hunt"

• But if the rougher sex by this fierce sport
  Is hurried wild, let not such horrid joy
  E’er stain the bosom of the British fair.
  Far be the spirit of the chase from them!
  Uncomely courage, unbeseeming skill,
  To spring the fence, the rein the prancing steed,
  The cap, the whip, the masculine attire.
  In which they roughen to the sense and all
  The winning softness of their sex is lost.
  • James Thomson, "Autumn"
  • J. J. C. Timaeus, ed., The Seasons (Hamburg, 1791)