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| The Hunt and Early Sabs |
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This is not a celebration of the local fox hunt, I'll get that straight from the beginning. Please read on, as it is an account of foxhunting by a country boy.
Shapwick was host to the local hunt on Boxing Day. Once, the showbiz personality, Jimmy Edwards, joined on horseback. The gatherings at Cross was, to be fair, an "event" in the Village year, and indeed a very colourful spectacle. As I recall, hunting was mostly carried out on the land farmed by the Tory family, and the Hyde Farm fields. Fox earths were encouraged to flourish in the copse called "Wills Wood" - this was "Fox Covert" to us, however - and in other locations also, no doubt. Nurture, then kill on the basis of being a pest. Odd way of thinking. The threat of "Foxey" to country folk livelihoods was made very clear to me as my Dad and I inspected the bloodied remains of our chickens after a nightly visit from our red friend. Despite this, I could never see the sense of hunting the ruddy thing. Hunting is not the most efficient way of control. It is simply a social event, built around the hunt. My Uncle and other chums began to find ways of fighting back. We took actions to disrupt, in some small way, the hunt... Before the hunt set off from Cross, we would be very busy with binder twine, wrapping it round and round the various gateways. This really frustrated the huntsmen, as they had to dismount and untie or cut the twine! And all this time, "Foxey" was getting away... Another time, we were leaning over a gate and "Foxey" can puffing along just a yard from our feet. A minute or two later, and "Johnny Hunt" rides up, and bellows "Now then, boys, which way did the fox run?". To a man (or boy) we all pointed the same direction. You can guess "Foxey" had gone the other way! We probably did little to save "Foxey" and his chums, but I feel I did something and at least, I can claim to have been an early "hunt sab", although the phrase had not been invented then. So, how can a country boy claim to be anti-hunt - well, I can say that there were many in my Village who did not agree with the hunt, but because they were employed by people who hunt, and live in tied cottages courtesy of people that hunt, it might have prevented free speech and action. Also, the country way of life is very different from the county way of life, which is what hunting is. If foxes must be controlled by hunting with hounds (and I disagree), then do it but why turn it into a social event? Stag hunting on Exmoor and the Quantocks is another example of the social county etiquette getting in the way of reality. If it is so efficient, why do they shoot when culling in Scotland? Why, when the tufters are out early to spot the "lame" stag, these guys are close enough to shoot the poor thing there and then. But, no, they just have to hunt it later when the poor sad things on horseback have breakfasted. Sad. I will end my anti-hunt spiel by admitting to those who turned up to shoot pheasant one misty morning only to find no birds set up by the beaters...the boys went through the kale field half an hour earlier and put the quarry into flight and away from trouble. Enjoyment through the death of another of God's creatures? Very sad and rather worrying...
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