Hunting Sketches (ePub)

Published in 1865, Anthony Trollope's Hunting Sketches takes the form of a collection of eight short texts that center around the subject of hunting. These eight texts are entitled: "The Man Who Hunts and Doesn't Like It," "The Man Who Hunts and Does Like IT," "The Lady Who Rides to Hounds," The Hunting Farmer," "The Man Who Hunts and Never Jumps," "The Hunting Parson," "The Master of Hounds," and "How to Ride to Hounds." Being clearly fascinated by the subject, the author first discusses the difference between those who do practice the sport with pleasure and those who do it without pleasure. The texts can generally serve as guides to nineteenth-century techniques, modes and styles of fox-hunting, hound-training and horse-riding. Trollope equally analyzes the way society appraises hunters. For instance, he explains the differences between male hunters and female hunters and claims that while the hunting farmer plays an indispensable role in the maintenance and the development of the sport, parsons and clergymen should not hunt since the activity is culturally believed to be incompatible with the nature of their religious function. By the very end of the sketches, Trollope insinuates that once you take his advice and guidance, "you can ride to hounds better than nineteen men out of every twenty that you have seen at the meet, and will have enjoyed the keenest pleasure that hunting, or perhaps, I may say, that any other amusement, can give you."