University of Virginia Library

Not that the squire of G--- has, like the Author of the Task, any lively sense of feeling for the poor animal. It is for the sake of the sport that he interdicts the molestation of his hares. Other sportsmen have congenial sentiments with himself. And with these characters the conquest of a little inoffensive creature is the ultimate pleasure of the chace. This, some philosophers argue, is inconsistent with human nature. The invigorating exercise that accompanies the chace, is certainly (say they) the actuating principle. And the necessity (they add) of supplying the table with food, is another leading motive. But philosophers, who derive their knowledge from books, argue from what human nature should be, rather than from what it is. Whoever has observed the perseverance with which our modern gentry pursue the flying hare, in spite of every disadvantage of country, and the triumphant exultations which are heard on every side when the wearied helpless animal falls a prey to his pursuers, will easily perceive that neither health nor appetite are motives for the chace; but that the actuating principle which impels our countrymen to the field is merely the cowardly satisfaction of seeing a poor little brown animal wearied and pleading for mercy, torn in pieces by the ravenous jaws of twenty couple of red and white animals which pursue him. And that man is received with every mark of triumph, who is nearest the defenceless creature when he falls, and feasts his eyes with the tortures of the mangled victim!