“Twice did the animal come within a few paces of where I was standing, and its condition of terror and exhaustion was painful to behold. The boys, running after the hounds, were thoroughly enjoying the thing, and two masters of the College, I was told, were amongst them. Now for the final scene, at which a friend of mine was present. “The hare, which had been hunted for two hours, having got into a corner at Upton Park which was bounded with wire-netting, was seized by the hounds and torn. The master of the pack then ran up, got hold of her, and broke her neck. The carcass was handed to one of the dog-keepers, who cut off the head and feet, which trophies were divided among the followers. The keeper with his knife then opened the body, and the master, taking it in his hands and holding it high above the hounds, rallied them with cries, and finally threw it into their midst, as they had, in the language of the _Eton College Chronicle_, ‘thoroughly deserved blood.’ “I make no comments upon these doings; I only say that I think the British public ought to know how boys are being trained at our foremost school in respect to the cultivation of compassionate instincts towards the beings beneath us.” It is not surprising that the Humanitarian League should have addressed remonstrances to Dr. Warre on the subject of the Beagles; one wonders rather that this “old Eton institution” should have so long remained unchallenged by societies which profess to protect animals from injury, and to teach humanity to the young, especially as Dr. Warre was himself a member of the committee of the Windsor and Eton Branch of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and as Etonian subscriptions go yearly to provide a fund for prosecuting carters and drovers who ill-use the animals under their charge! THE LIBERTY OF THE BOYS. To all these protests Dr. Warre had practically but one answer--that hare-hunting not being _illegal_, he could not interfere with the liberty of the boys in the matter, many of whom, he stated, are in the habit of hunting “when at home in the holidays, and with the approval of their parents.” But this plea is at once invalidated by the fact that many things are prohibited to schoolboys which may (or may not) be permitted to them at home, and which are not in themselves illegal. Some of the elder boys, for example, smoke when at home in the holidays, and with the approval of their parents; yet if these young gentlemen, relying on Dr. Warre’s argument, had started a smoking-club at Eton, he would not have hesitated to interfere very promptly with their freedom. Why, then, should an excuse which is not nearly good enough to justify a smoking-club be seriously put forward by the headmaster of a great public school when a cruelty-club is in question?