16 THOUGHTS ON HUNTING 



Melt in soft blandishments, and humble joy : 



His glossy skin, or yellow-pied, or blue, 



In lights or shades, by Nature's pencil drawn, 



Reflects the various tints : his ears and legs, 



Fleckt here and there in gay enamell'd pride, 



Rival the speckled pard : his rush-grown tail 



O'er his broad back bends in an ample arch. 



On shoulders clean, upright and firm he stands : 



His round cat-foot, straight hams, and wide-spread thighb, 



And his low-dropping chest, confess his speed : 



His strength, his wind, or on the steepy hill, 



Or far-extended plain ; in every part 



So well proportion'd, that the nicer skill 



Of Phidias himself can't blame thy choice. 



Of such compose thy pack. 



The colour I think of little moment ; and am of opinion with our friend 

 Foote, respecting his negro friend, that a good dog, like a good candidate, 

 cannot be of a bad colour. 



Men are too apt to be prejudiced by the sort of hound which they 

 themselves have been most accustomed to. Those who have been used 

 to the sharp-nosed fox-hound, will hardly allow a large-headed hound to 

 be a fox-hound ; yet they both equally are : speed and beauty are the 

 chief excellences of the one ; while stoutness, and tenderness of nose, in 

 hunting, 1 are characteristic of the other. I could tell you, that I have seen 

 very good sport with very unhandsome packs, consisting of hounds of 

 various sizes, differing from one another as much in shape and look as in 

 their colour ; nor could there be traced the least sign of consanguinity 

 amongst them. Considered separately, the hounds were good ; as a pack 

 of hounds, they were not to be commended ; nor would you be satisfied 

 with anything that looked so very incomplete. You will find nothing 

 so essential to your sport, as that your hounds should run well together ; 

 nor can this end be better attained, than by confining yourself, as near as 

 you "can, to those of the same sort, size, and shape. 



A great excellence in a pack of hounds, is the head they carry ; and 

 that pack may be said to go the fastest, that can run ten miles the soonest ; 

 notwithstanding the hounds, separately, may not run so fast as many 

 others. A pack of hounds, considered in a collective body, go fast, in 

 proportion to the excellence of their noses, and the head they carry ; as 

 that traveller generally gets soonest to his journey's end who stops least 

 upon the road. Some hounds that I have hunted with, would creep all 

 through the same hole, though they might have leapt the hedge, and 

 would follow one another in a string, as true as a team of cart-horses. I 

 had rather see them, like the horses of the sun, all a-breast. 



1 H parait que la finesse de 1'odorat, dans les chiens, depend de la grosseur plus que de la 

 longueur du museau. (It appears that delicacy of scenting power in dogs depends rather on 

 the size than the length of the muzzle.) BUFFON. 



