Hare and Hounds.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 29 May 1913, Page 4

Hare and Hounds.

—!• THE SPORT AT ETON. (From a Correspondent.) LONDON, April 9. Almost under the walls of Eton College rocontly, a hard-pressed hart which the boys of the college had been hunting with a pack of hounds maintained at the collego for tliiß purpose, twico swam the river with the pack close behind, and half a hundred boy« yelling like liends on the banks, and was in tho act of swimming it the third time when it was pulled under and killed, amid the enL'iusiastic cheers of the yound Etoni; ns. A similar triumph of tho Eton beagles, it may bo remembered, was recalled, by Lord Rossmore, in his recent hook of reminiscences in these words:—"One of the prettiest things I ever saw was « hare, very hard-pressed, that took to tho watsi and swam right out into the middle with kill the hounds after her, hut she was. unfortunately, so beat that sht was drowned From sheer exhaustion hall* way across." The latest incident lias shocked humanitarians and an influentially signed petition was presented, the other day, to Canon Lyttelton, tho reverend headmaster of Eton College. bogging him to do away with the pastime of hare-hunting at Eton on the ground that its effect is "to stimulate cruelty Among tho young, riiis. bv the way, is by no means tin | first. i)etition of the kind that has been laid before a "head" of the Famous College with a similnr object, others in the past having been signed by Herbert Spencer. .Sir Frederick Treves. >Sir A. Conan Doyle, the lat< Lord olsole.v and other Famour men --but all without awul. After dm i<-fleet ion. Cnnon Lyttelton has re plied to the petition with a letter in which he declines to do awav with the beagles. Ho assert# that fai Irom being an increase in cruelty among English boys, "many educators are not without, misgiving at the almost unnatural gentleness of the modern schoolboy compared witii his forofathor." "How i, ls ig n ifi. cant, then." says tho Canon, "must the influence of this kind of hunting have been in the opposite direction!"

Then the headmaster goes on tc «'vo ;ts Ills reason lor refusing to do awav with the organiser] hare-conrs-ing at Eton his belief that "to prohibit a crusading against certain birds and animals which is certain t< exist among the young, is likely to goad it into undesirable forms of activity."

Canon L.vttelton f.s afraid, too, lost ho may "create a schism" between fathers arul sons if he docs away with the Eton beagles. "Thoro is the fact," said he. "that our boys como Prom homes where the. instinct alluded to receives ample and incessant encouragement, so that, besidr* alienating the boys by legislation to (hem wholly unintelligible, the head master would alienate a great r, ( anv parents, which is not nearly ho important as tlic further fact- that "•"Hid bf doing his utmost to creal< a schism between fathers and sons. Hie fa lion ends his letter by do daring that, "as fjir as possible, all cruelty has been banished" from the hunting and killing: of hares by the Eton boys. Needless to say. his reply lins called forth a broadside of hitter attack. One of those who pays his compliments to the Canon in no uncertain terms is Sir Philip F.lnrtie Jones, while among tho roverend headmaster's critics are several old Etonians, one of whom after recallng Lord Rossmore's "pretfv jifiljfc." remarks: "That's my M«. of how tho youfh of the nation should ho brought up. and (hat's why I am m hearty sympathy with Canon Lvttel ton's reasoning. Let him go on as he is going, then ho will run no •risk of offending Lord Rung or Gorgias Midas, or other influential people wlio have their sons at Eton. 1 ivas nearly 60 rcn years there mvsolf and was never troubled by any pid humanitarian teaching." ' An other satirist remarks 'that "nfter '•<v«ling Canon Lyttelton's ingenious r K't'Tic," he Vioiccs to think thai Hwrr ~s a .great future before Eton •is a seminary for budding "theologians."