Fox hunting, pheasant shooting, and comparative law

When Herbert teas gone he sat musing over his fire with Aby's letter still in his hand. A lawyer has always a sort of affection for a scoundrel, - suc h affection as a hunting man has for a fore. He loves to watch the skill an d dodges of the animal, to study the wiles by which he lives, and to circum vent them by wiles of his own, still more wily. It is his glory to run the beast down; but then he would not for worlds run him down, except in confor mity with certain laws, fixed by old custom for the guidance of men in such sports. And the two-legged vermin is adapted for pursuit as is the fox wit h four legs. He is an unclean animal, leaving a scent upon his trail, which the nose of your acute law hound can pick out over almost any ground. And the more wily the beast is, the longer he can run, the more trouble he can give in the pursuit the longer he can stand up before a pack of legal hound s, the better does the forensic sportsman love and value him. There are fox es of so excellent a nature, so keen in their dodges, so perfect in their c unning, so skillful in evasion, that a sportsman cannot find it in his hear t to push them to their destruction unless the field be very large so that many eyes are looking on. And the feeling is I think the same with lawyers.