232 THOUGHTS ON HUNTING 



spread not the cover, but run tamely on the line of 

 one another, I shall fear it is a sort that will not please 

 you long. A fox-hound that has not spirit and ambi- 

 tion to get forward at a time like this, is at no other 

 likely to do much good. 



You mention, in your last Letter, pretty hounds : 

 certainly I should not pretend to criticise others, who 

 am so incorrect myself; yet, with your leave, I think 

 I can set you right in that particular. Pretty is an 

 epithet improperly applied to a fox-hound : we call a 

 fox-hound handsome, when he is strong, bony, of a 

 proper size, and of exact symmetry ; and fitness is 

 made essential to beauty. A beagle may be pretty ; 

 but, according to my idea of the word, a fox-hound 

 cannot : but, as it is not to be supposed that you will 

 keep a pack of fox-hounds for the pleasure of looking 

 at them, without doubt, you will think goodness more 

 necessary than beauty. Should you be ambitious to 

 have a handsome pack of hounds, on no account ought 

 you to enter an ugly dog, lest you be tempted to keep 

 him afterwards. 



I once heard an old sportsman say, that he thought 

 a fox, to show sport, should run four hours at least ; 

 and I suppose he did not care how slow his hounds 

 went after him. This idea, however, is not conceived 

 in the true spirit of fox-hunting — which is not to walk 

 down a fox, or starve him to death ; but to keep close 

 at him, and kill him as soon as you can. I am 

 convinced that a fox-hound may hunt too much : if 

 tender-nosed, and not over-hurried, he will always 

 hunt enough ; whilst the highest -bred hounds may 



