Letter: Urban louts, rural hunters

Sir: Why so mealy-mouthed? A ban on fox-hunting will not merely deprive the hound pictured on your front page (17 June) of his livelihood, but of his life. There will be no place for the 60,000-odd hounds that make up the packs of England. They will not find cosy homes in someone's house; they are pack animals, trained over centuries for one purpose: to follow and kill as quickly as possible (vastly quicker than a snare, or a shotgun wielded by a lousy shot) an animal which does much harm and little good to the countryside, however enchanting it may be as a cub.

The hounds cannot become pets. They will all be killed. Imagine how.

CORNELIA STARKS

Donnington, Gloucestershire