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Lyell's comments are interesting in that they suggest that the hunted animals assent
to the hunt. Indeed, this idea implicitly underlies the whole representation of the
fox as a sporting foe. It attributes to the fox intentions and emotions which cannot
be tested—that the fox shows 'cunning', that the fox is 'brave', that the fox 'enjoys'
the chase. In this representation the fox is therefore translated not into the form of
scientific knowledge, but into the form of anecdote, art, literary description and
country knowledge. It is in the form of these immutable mobiles that the fox is
displaced in this representation into the political arena. Hence, Moore's admiration
of the fox's cunning follows from a description of a day's hunting in which he
observes an unusual quick kill, and a fox going to earth after a chase, 'as the
huntsman comes slowly towards us through the bushes, weary and hatless and
bursting with pride, with tired hounds beside him, it is impossible not to cheer'
(Moore 1998:2). Moore's fox was elusive, but through his cheerful anecdotal
account the fox is translated into a cunning victor. Mobilising the same
representation of the fox during the parliamentary debate, Peter Brooke drew on
Shakespeare for his authority:
I understand the fox's place in the scheme of things. I derive pleasure from
watching the fox in its habitat, and my admiration for its qualities of resource
and adaptability are akin to Shakespeare's, who, in 33 references to the fox, is
admiring of it in 31.
(
Hansard,
301, 28 November 1997: col. 1230)
Yet in claiming authority for Shakespeare's representation of the fox, Brooke is
inviting scrutiny of the process of representation involved. The translation of the fox
into Shakespeare's text or Moore's anecdote requires no scientific or physical
enrolment, and the representation here is validated only in that the fox continues to
run from its pursuers, more often than not escaping. Through the explanations of
fox behaviour offered by country lore, it is effectively legitimised by a mystic sense
of 'understanding nature'. Unsurprisingly, therefore, the representation is challenged
by the opponents of hunting, who claim to have captured a more authentic
representation of the fox. So, for example, the proposer of the Wild Mammals Bill,
Michael Foster, employed anecdote to rebut the fox-as-sporting-foe representation:
I followed the hunt on foot and in a four-by-four vehicle. Three foxes were
sighted and chased, but none was caught. They were followed by some 40
dogs hot in pursuit. One fox came within three feet of where I happened to
be standing. It was certainly not happy; indeed it looked panicked, and did
not know what to do. It is therefore surprising that the [Countryside Alliance
director] Robin Hanbury-Tenison should have said: 'If you have ever been
hunting, you've seen how foxes laugh at the hounds.' Foxes do not laugh at
hounds when they are being chased, and to suggest otherwise is to act with
ignorant disregard for the welfare of animals.
(
Hansard,
301, 28 November 1997: col. 1202)
