igo ROYAL ROCK BEAGLE HUNT. 



becoming exhausted, althougli this is hardly reconcilable with the fact that 

 a piece of old rabbit skin trailed along the ground for ten or twelve miles 

 will afford scent for a drag hunt which liounds can readily fallow to the end ; 

 and there is no reason to suppose that the same piece of skin would not 

 repeat the performance again and again. 



When the hounds have run into their game, there is great emulation 

 among the beaglers to be first up to "save" (as it is called) the hare, over 

 which process very little time must be lost or there will be nothing left. 

 This saving is done with cries of " Dead ! dead I leave it ! " and a gentle 

 application of the whip among the eager hounds. The first and paramount 

 duty is to adminster the ('ou/> dc grace by striking the hare shirply on the 

 back of the neck, holding her up by the ears so that the weight of the b xly 

 stretches the cervical vertebrjE, rendering it quite easy to dislocate the spine 

 and cause an instant and painless death. 



The cry of "Who-hoop!" will summon the rest of the field, the hounds 

 baying round the while. The Master then decides whether the hounds shall 

 have the hare or not : if they deserve it, they get her. 



Scent. 



" To wake a wolf is .^s bad as to smell a fox." 



King; Heiny II'., Part II, act i, scene 2. 



There is a mystery about scent which generations of huntsmen have 



been unable to fathom. The best sportsmen are at fault whenever they 



venture to dogmatise on the subject, quite as ofcen as hounds are at fault in 



running the line. It is often said : There will be no scent to-day, with this 



frost, or with this beastly east wind, with this heavy rain, bright sunshine, 



or with the thousand-and-one grievances of the grum!)ling sportsman ; and 



just as often the scent is the very opposite of what is predicted. Similarly, 



on what, theoretically, should be good scenting days, the hounds sometimes 



puzzle over the scent, and, as the expression goes, cannot run a yard. It 



seems as if, with all the numerous observed facts, it is impossible to reduce 



this question to an exact science. 



So exquisitely delicate his sense ! 

 Should some more curious sportsman here enquire 

 Whence this sagacity, this wondrous power 

 Of tracing step by step or man or brute ? 

 What guide invisible points out their way 

 O'er the dark 'uarsh, bleak hill, and sandy plain ? 

 The courteous Muse shall the dark cause reveal. 

 The blood that from the heart incessant rolls 

 In many a crimson tide, then here and there 

 In smaller rills disparted, as it flows 

 Propell'd, the serous particles evade 

 Through th' open pores, and with the ambient air 



