higher degree by giving real security to the tenant. But a system for which there is absolutely nothing to be said, is that which would fail to evoke either of these motive powers; which would shackle the landlord without freeing the tenant, and under a net of inducements and counter-inducements, of checks and counter-checks, would stifle all vigorous life. Such, I venture to think, would be the effect of the solution of the Irish problem recommended by the high authority of Mr. Caird. But such a result can scarcely now become definitive. Things have gone too far for that. The attempt to accomplish it would, however, immensely aggravate all the dangerous elements of the situation, and probably in the end involve us in extreme courses, which might now be avoided.

J. E. CAIRNES.

A FEW WORDS ON MR. TROLLOPE'S DEFENCE OF

FOX-HUNTING.

ONE portion at least of Mr. Trollope's defence of fox-hunting must be satisfactory, at any rate, to its opponents, for it is grounded upon the ancient doctrine which we are most of us well prepared to contest -that whatever is, is right. He sets out by asserting that foxhunting cannot be unfit for "polite men," since English gentlemen do it. It is probably not without intention that Mr. Trollope leaves to his adversaries the odium of replying that all English gentlemen are not gentle, nor fox-hunters the gentlest among them. But this answer of Mr. Trollope's can weigh absolutely nothing in the scale of reason, though very weighty in that of prejudice; for whoever attacks a prevailing vice will always be answered that highly respectable people practise it. It would not be prevailing if they did not; nor (we may add) much worth the trouble of such a man as Mr. Freeman to attack it, if no decent people were guilty of it. If Mr. Freeman were to take the trouble to tell English gentlemen that it is unrefined to swear, or to come reeling with wine into the House of Commons, doubtless he would not now be answered that these things must be refined, for English gentlemen do them. But a hundred years ago it would have been worth his while to tell them so, and then he would have been answered that if not precisely refined or refining in their own nature, there was nothing in these things necessarily inconsistent with the highest refinement, since they might be witnessed any day in the persons of English gentleThat English gentlemen do what we assert is coarse and cruel, can be no conclusive evidence that the practices are not coarse

men.

or cruel, except in the eyes of those who are prepared to assert that English gentlemen are not susceptible of any higher stage of refinement and humanity than all of them have yet attained. Looking at the matter from this point of view, most English gentlemen, even including Mr. Trollope, will probably acknowledge that the argument is worth just nothing at all.

Mr. Trollope's second argument he puts in the following words :

"Do we not know, also, that under God's hands, animals suffer pain worse than any inflicted by humanity,-the unsatisfied pangs of prolonged hunger, till death comes and releases? Does not the pike hunt the gudgeon, and the trout the minnow? Does not the fox hunt the rabbit, and the cat the mouse? Is it not God's ordinance that among animals every kind of suffering should prevail, to which the fox is subject when the hounds are after him? Is it not in compliance with an instinct given by God that the hound does hunt the fox ?"

And (Mr. Trollope might have added) that man hunts the fox too. We answer emphatically, Yes, it is God's ordinance; it is in compliance with an instinct given by the Creator of man, and of the hounds, and of the fox, that all these creatures, left to some of their instincts, delight in war, in cruelty, in death; above all things, delight in that sense of vigour, of power, of life, which is given by a triumphant chase of anything, alive or dead, from a butterfly up to an elephant, from a fox up to the secrets of the universe.

But are Mr. Trollope and the defenders of fox-hunting prepared to follow this reasoning to its ultimate results? Granted that foxhunting is in pursuance of a natural instinct, common to man with the lower animals; granted that the suffering it inflicts is not more atrocious than what takes place by the ordinance of nature; granted that the contemplation of an animal hunted to death,-hunted, that is, till it sinks from exhaustion, and then is torn alive, limb from limb, for man's pleasure,-granted that this is not more revolting to all the best instincts of man than things which take place every day beyond our power, and which surround us in this universe; our granting all this will not advance us one inch on the way to justify fox-hunting before the tribunal of man's reason and conscience. Are murder, incest, the promiscuous intercourse of the sexes, cannibalism, right, because they too all exist by God's ordinance, and in compliance with instincts given by God to dogs, to men, to wolves? Shall a man say, "I am justified in only eating now and then one of my dear little babies (which I fatten up for the purpose, and save from all suffering the while), since I see rabbits and dogs that eat up half a dozen of their puppies and little rabbits all at once? Since God made dogs and rabbits, can I be wrong to do as they do?" If such reasoning were to be admitted, if the fact that evil exists in the world is to be accepted as an excuse for our practising it, we must renounce at once all the restraints of civilisation, and no crime

could ever be called wicked if any man or beast could be found to practise it, now or in past time. Dr. Watts tells us to leave barking and biting to dogs; Mr. Trollope reverses the moral, and tells us to take a lesson from the cat that hunts the mouse, the dog that hunts the fox; for well may man be envious of such pure sources of delight, and ill can he afford to drop them out of the list of his God-given pleasures! A more ludicrous parody of a special Providence was never suggested, than that his scent was given to the fox expressly to give men and dogs the pleasure of hunting him. Or may it be said that a more mournful blasphemy could never shock the ears of a believer in a beneficent Creator.

Common sense, the philosophical doctrine of human progress, and the theological dogma of the regeneration of man's nature by God's grace, are all of one accord in refusing to accept the preposterous justification for fox-hunting (or for anything else) that it is natural, and not more mischievous than a thousand other natural things. It is useless to heap up a list of the horrors and enormities, moral and physical, that go on among men and animals in a state of nature, and ask us-is fox-hunting as bad as these? Civilised man has left far behind him the code of morals of his own ancestors; and to appeal further back than even these, to the brute creation, for examples and for tests, is to stand self-condemned. In one instance, it is true, Mr. Trollope appeals to a higher example for justification, and cites the lady who crushes the wasp with her fan. Who is the lady who would do it? Not sweet Lily Dale surely. Perhaps the wives and daughters of fox-hunters may do such things; most other English women, rich or poor, would shudder with disgust at such a sight. In the society which is either above or below foxhunting and field-sports, the infliction of death is considered a painful and revolting sight; and if animals are not spared from death, human beings are spared the sight of its infliction whenever it is not a matter of duty to confront it; and the sense of duty, with the grave energy that accompanies it, is surely a fitter association for what should be felt to be the awful spectacle of the pain and death of any living creature, than the exhilarating sense of enjoyment that must accompany a pleasant day's hunting.

Mr. Trollope says (and probably most of his readers will fully and heartily agree with him) that the pleasure of fox-hunting is in no way the pleasure of giving pain. And he asks whether the pleasure of giving pain has more to do with the pleasure of hunting than with the pleasure of wearing beautiful furs? In this illustration, evidently given with the most perfect good faith by Mr. Trollope, may be observed a confusion of ideas, which is at the bottom of every defence of hunting usually put forth by otherwise good and kindly people. The pleasure a lady takes in her beautiful furs is not in

separably bound up, or even naturally connected, with the pain inflicted in procuring them. She might be (I do not say she ought to be) accused of heartlessness or thoughtlessness in taking pleasure in them in spite of the pain they cost the hunted animal, but she could not be accused of cruelty. The pleasure she takes in possessing or wearing them is of precisely the same kind as she feels in diamonds, lace, flowers, or other things, beautiful in themselves, ornamental to her, and associated with the pleasant ideas of wealth, rank, and beauty. It would make no difference in her enjoyment if the furs were made by hand, the diamonds got by hunting, the flowers found in mines, or the lace grown in hot-houses. The kind, the quantity, the sources of her enjoyment of each separate article, would be the same. She does not enjoy the sables, she would not enjoy the diamonds, because they were got by hunting. The excitement of the chase is as absolutely foreign to her enjoyment of her furs as to that of her flowers.

Now can the same thing be said of the pleasure of fox-hunting? In what consists the special fascination of fox-hunting? What is it that men are unwilling to relinquish in it? I admit that I sincerely believe it is not, unless in rare exceptional cases, the cruel manner of death. So far, I believe Mr. Trollope to be right, although it will be seen presently that I believe Mr. Freeman to be still more right when he says that to take pleasure in hunting is to take pleasure in the infliction of pain. I grant-not merely for the sake of argument, but as a substantial truth-that, as a general rule, fox-hunters do not enjoy the sport because they enjoy either the sight or the thought of the agony inflicted on the fox, be it great or little, long or short. What, then, do they enjoy? "Society and conversation," answers Mr. Trollope.

"Men are thrown together who would not otherwise meet. . . Perhaps of all the delights of the hunting-field conversation is the most general. Fresh air and exercise are gained by men who greatly need it. . . . There is enterprise in riding to hounds, and skill. Ambition, courage, and persistency, are all brought into play. A community is formed in which equality prevails, and the man with small means and no rank holds his own against the lord or the millionaire as he can do nowhere else amidst the scenes of our life."

Here four distinct sources of enjoyment are enumerated:-1. Fresh air and exercise; 2. Conversation; 3. The exercise of skill and courage; 4. Associating with and equalling in skill our superiors in rank. All these sources of pleasure may fairly be compared with the pleasure the lady takes in her furs; they may be enjoyed in spite of the suffering inflicted on the fox; they are not derived from the suffering itself. So far I go along with Mr. Trollope; and grant that, even if it be heartless and thoughtless to derive pleasure from what cannot be got without the infliction of pain, it is not necessarily cruel.

But which of these pleasures necessarily requires that a fox should be hunted in order to its attainment? Not one. Men of different ranks and occupations can meet together out of doors for games of skill and exercise, without hunting a fox. One of two things is clear: either that men might enjoy all the pleasures of fox-hunting without hunting foxes, or that the pleasure of fox-hunting is in the excitement of the chase. Either hunting the fox is merely an accidental way in which men have got accustomed to associate together to obtain the pleasures of society and conversation in the open air, of exercise, and of rivalry in skill and courage-pleasures which they might just as well obtain without inflicting pain on anything; or else the real pleasure of fox-hunting consists in the excitement of chasing something that is urged to try to escape from you by the strongest inducements of fear that nature is capable of feeling. Either fox-hunting is immoral, because an unnecessarily cruel way of procuring enjoyments which men might contrive to obtain in a more innocent form; or else it is in its essence cruel-that is to say, it is pleasure derived from the fact that pain is inflicted. We must distinguish here between pleasure in the very fact of inflicting pain, or in the sight of blood and torture (which it has been already admitted that probably few fox-hunters feel), and pleasure derived from the excitement which only the infliction of pain can produce; which excitement, the true essence of the pleasure of the chase, is again quite a distinct thing from the pleasure in conversation, fresh air, exercise, &c., accidentally associated with the hunt. It is this pleasure of the chase which I believe to be the real attraction of fox-hunting, and to be demonstrably cruel in its own nature, and degrading in its effect on human character.

in one

The love of the chase belongs to the lower, because the more selfish part of our nature. The desire to overcome, to exercise power, to domineer, to destroy, may all be turned to good purpose; and there are few enjoyments more keen than when we permit full play to the lower instincts of our nature under the guidance of our reason and conscience. War and the chase may call forth common purpose the various powers of our nature, the higher and the lower, but the lower must be under the guidance of the higher, to constitute these pursuits legitimate sources of pleasure. Artificial war and unnecessary hunting can only be carried on for the mere indulgence of the instinctive passions. The Romans kept enemies alive to enjoy the sight of artificial warfare in their amphitheatres, just as we keep foxes alive for an artificial chase. That the foxes would never have lived if we had not wanted to hunt them, makes no difference in the nature of the pleasure taken in hunting them-a pleasure derived from the fierce excitement of chasing a living creature under the terror of death. If we ask