man should be more sacred than theirs.

All this is not sufficiently remembered by some of us when the
period of the year comes which is trying to the farmer's
heart, when the young clover is growing, and the barley has been
just sown. Farmers, as a rule, do not think very much of their
wheat. When such riding is practicable, of course they like to
see men take the headlands and furrows; but their hearts are not
broken by the tracks of horses across their wheat-fields. I
doubt, indeed, whether wheat is ever much injured by such usage.
But let the thoughtful rider avoid the new-sown barley; and,
above all things, let him give a wide berth to the new-laid
meadows of artificial grasses. They are never large, and may
always be shunned. To them the poaching of numerous horses is
absolute destruction. The surface of such enclosures should be as
smooth as a billiard-table, so that no water may lie in holes;
and, moreover, any young plant cut by a horse's foot is trodden
out of existence. Farmers do see even this done, and live through
it without open warfare; but they should not be put to such
trials of temper or pocket too often.

And now for my friend the hunting farmer in person, the
sportsman whom I always regard as the most indispensable adjunct
to the field, to whom I tender my spare cigar with the most
perfect expression of my good will. His dress is nearly always
the same. He wears a thick black coat, dark brown breeches, and
top boots, very white in colour, or of a very dark mahogany,
according to his taste. The hunting farmer of the old school
generally rides in a chimney-pot hat; but, in this particular,
the younger brethren of the plough are leaving their old habits,