provide herself with a groom, whose services will be very useful to
her, in the event of anything going wrong, and in helping her in various
ways. It would be absurd for her to expect casual aid at every turn, in
a large field composed chiefly of strangers, especially when its giver
would be deprived of his place in a run.

Pilots seem to be going out of fashion, if we may judge by the large
number of women who hunt safely without their assistance. The
inexperienced huntress generally has her father, brother, husband, or
some male friend or servant to show her the way, which is the safest and
best method of learning to hunt, because they would know both the
capabilities of the young lady and her mount, and could be trusted to
keep her out of harm's way. If a paid pilot is engaged, his horse should
not be a better fencer than that of his charge. He should also know her
riding form, and over what kind of jumps she intends him to lead her.

I would strongly impress on an inexperienced lady the necessity of
learning to judge pace, that is to say, to know at what speed her horse
is going. The chief duty of a pilot is to set the pace for her, and to
select such fences as he knows her horse is capable of jumping, the
former being more important than the latter, as it is far more difficult
to learn. She should see that her pilot is safely over a fence before
sending her horse at it. Only practice and natural aptitude can teach a
lady to judge pace: it cannot be learnt from any book.

A lady should not deceive her pilot, any more than we should withhold
the truth from our doctor or lawyer. If she feels more in skirting trim
than in hard hunting nerve, she should not hesitate to say so; for we
all like to take things easy at times, whether it be in hunting or in
anything else, according as we feel fit or otherwise. There is no
gainsaying that the human barometer is regulated to a great extent by
the weather, as we may see by the big fields which greet the Master on a
fine hunting morning.

The unpleasant disclosures which have been recently made in our Law
Courts, concerning the free and easy conduct of a certain set of hunting
men and women, may prejudice many mothers against hunting as a fitting
pastime for their daughters; but the indiscretions of a few idle fast
people should not be taken as a sample of the behaviour of an entire
field. In the crowd and bustle of hunting, the large majority of the
people are seriously enga