n IN answer to M S Large, George Cowley writes about the cruelty of a fox when it rips the quarry's heads off (You Say, December 7)

Unfortunately, Mr Cowley's letter was so brief that I don't know if he was defending, the fox or stating the obvious. Anyway, what a fox does to a hen or a rabbit is natural. But, when the foxhunting fraternity does it, it's despicable.

In the wild, a fox may kill one bird, but inside a pen the birds cannot escape and as they panic, the fox gets excited and may decimate the whole lot.

This sort of behaviour is not dissimilar to when there's the slightest hint of a food shortage.

People, too, will go to supermarkets and greedily stock up more provisions than they could possibly eat.

The only difference is that the fox doesn't know any different. But Man does!

MR L SPITERI,

Worcester.