[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] Sirs,—Your correspondent " Whipper-In
" cites Shakespeare and Stevenson in support of his remarkable contention that " stag-hunters and fox-hunters are the true friends of the animals they hunt "—Shakespeare, who wrote the soliloquy of the melancholy Jaques, and Stevenson, who, as Mrs. Steven- son told me, " probably never killed an animal in his life."
To the humanitarian it is immaterial whether a sport is the privilege of the " idle rich " or the presumably industrious poor, but the latter are condemned, and frequently punished, for coursing rabbits and fighting dogs, while the former, who inflict suffering and death on stags and foxes, are eulogized as " fostering friendliness and understanding among all classes."
The statement that the inexorable decree of Nature to her children of the animal kingdom (to which men humanitarians belong) is " Hunt and be hunted," requires some modification, for those of the animal kingdom who hunt stags and foxes have never been pursued by, for instance, a pack of wolves intent on their destruction. Does the delight of hunting consist in the contemplation of the terror and death of the member of the animal kingdom hunted ? If not, why not substitute the " drag," which admittedly supplies all the best
elements of the sport ?—I am, Sir, &c., EDGAR SYERS.
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