ON THE WALL OF MY STUDY hangs a dusty print of Mr Fox’s Hunt Breakfast on Christmas Day by the illustrator Harry Neilson. Mr Fox is a cheery old boy, dressed in hunting fig, with more than a hint of the Terry Thomas about him. His foxy guests sit alongside, similarly attired, dining off roast pheasant and boiled eggs. On the oak-panelled wall behind them, artworks can be seen featuring huntsmen run to ground or suffering crashing falls from their steeds. Hound masks are mounted on shields, their severed sterns hang like brushes beneath.
We obviously know this is fantasy. Hounds kill foxes, foxes don’t kill hounds, nor for that matter do they dress in hunting pink and pass the port, even the most doe-eyed townsman knows this to be the case.
Yet for all that in
