Cross Country with Horse and Hound

Strange as it may seem, there never has been a book published in America on the subject of cross country riding to hounds. Having moved into a hunting country without previous knowledge of the sport, the author undertook to follow the hounds after witnessing a run from a friend's carriage. To his chagrin, he discovered how much he had been against the unwritten laws of the hunting field, and he determined to place in the hands of similar uninitiated ones something in the nature of a guide. This work is therefore intended to give the novice an insight into the game from the point of view both of hunting and of riding, so that he may obtain from the sport a full measure of the delights it has to offer. The author has had considerable experience in breeding, rearing, and schooling hunters and has been fortunate in bringing to this work quite extensive observations of many different packs of hounds in European countries, as well as in the United States and Canada. His chief aim is to encourage this most noble sport for sport's sake, to contrast the genuine sportsman with the artificial, and to pay to that noblest of animals, the horse, and especially the "hunter," a debt of gratitude for many a glorious hour in his company.