HARE-HUNTING 



were the only people who really saw this run. The greater 

 part of it was in the Puckeridge country.' 



Mr. Race recalls another remarkable run, straight — and 

 eight miles from point to point. 



Mr. Baron D. Webster, for ten years master and owner of 

 the Haldon, has kindly sent me some interesting notes : — ' I 

 have, during my experience, seen less of the extraordinary 

 cunning of the hare than might have been expected. Where 

 our country is mostly moor or woodland, hares are scarce, and 

 they run far more like foxes than they do in an enclosed 

 district. . . . 



' During my first season as Master of the Haldon we had 

 a run which for pace and distance can very seldom have been 

 surpassed. On jMonday, 14th February 1898, we met at 

 Ashwell Cross : we did no good with our first hare. It was the 

 second one that gave the run : we found her exactly at one 

 o'clock on the ojDcn moor between Lidwell and Xewtake. 

 She got up behind the hounds, so they did not see her, and they 

 were laid on the line with as little noise as possible. Our hare 

 made at once for Newtake, and hounds ran at a fair pace the 

 whole length of this lonw narrow ororse brake and checked a 



O CD t^ 



moment at the Ashwell end. Hittinw off the line again, thev 

 ran well over the open part of Humber Moor and seemed to be 

 making for the Pheasant covert about Lindridge House, but 

 turning away from Lindridge they ran well down the green lane, 

 and skirting Luton Moor, were brought to their noses on 

 some plough till they came to the dreaded Luton Bottom. 

 Crossing this deep " goyle " or dingle, hounds hesitated a little 

 on the further side and gave such of the field who were inclined 

 to negotiate it time to find the only possible crossing. Those 

 who did not care to face the difficulties of the goyle saw no more 

 of the hunt. The hare then took us into Rixtail Moor (she 

 had been crossing a good deal of partly enclosed moorland) 

 and hence she ran the road for a very long distance. I kept 

 the now much reduced field well behind hounds, but had just 

 begun to fear we had pressed them over the point where the 



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