In 1997 Britain elected a government that promised a vote on banning the sport and Mr Downing, seeing the writing on the wall, left the next year. (Fox-hunting was eventually banned in 2004.) After three years with a hunt in Alabama, he moved to Virginia, where English-style fox-hunting has been popular since George Washington's day.

ECONOMIST: Going to America

For the class warriors of the left, fox-hunting is wrong because the structure of the hunt reflects ossified social hierarchies.

ECONOMIST: Fox-hunting: Blair’s bugle | The