98 THOUGHTS ON HUNTING 



sometimes hurt their hounds. I have heard of a sportsman who never suffers 

 his hounds to be lifted : he lets them pick along the coldest scent, through 

 flocks of sheep : this is a particular style of fox-hunting, which, perhaps, 

 may suit the country in which that gentleman hunts. I confess to you, I 

 do not think that it would succeed in a bad-scenting country, or, indeed, 

 in any country where foxes are wild. While hounds can get on with the 

 scent, it cannot be right to take them off from it ; but when they are stopped 

 for want of it, it cannot then be wrong to give them every advantage in your 

 power. 



It is wrong to suffer hounds to hunt after others that are gone on with 

 the scent, particularly in cover ; for how are they to get up to them with a 

 worse scent ? Besides, it makes them tie on the scent, teaches them to run 

 dog, and destroys that laudable ambition of getting forward which is the 

 chief excellence of a fox-hound. A good huntsman will seldom suffer his 

 head hounds to run away from him ; if it should so happen, and they be 

 still within his hearing, he will sink the wind with the rest of the pack, and 

 get to them as fast as he can. Though I suffer not a pack of fox-hounds to 

 hunt after such as may be a long way before the rest, for reasons which I 

 have just given ; yet, when a single hound is gone on with the scent, I send 

 a whipper-in to stop him. Were the hounds to be taken off the scent to get 

 to him, and he should no longer have any scent when they find him, the fox 

 might be lost by it. This is a reason why, in large covers, and particularly 

 such as have many roads in them, skirting hounds should be left at home on 

 windy days. 



Skirters, I think, you may find hurtful, both in men and dogs. Such as 

 skirt to save their horses, often head the fox. Good sportsmen never quit 

 hounds but to be of service to them : with men of this description, skirting 

 becomes a necessary part of fox-hunting, and is of the greatest use. Skirters, 

 beware of a furze-brake ! If you head back the fox, the hounds, most prob- 

 ably, will kill him in the brake. Such as ride after the hounds, at the same 

 time that they do no good, are least likely to do harm : let such only as 

 understand the business, and mean to be of service to the hounds, ride wide 

 of them. I cannot, however, allow, that the riding close up to hounds is 

 always a sign of a good sportsman ; if it were, a monkey, upon a good horse, 

 would be the best sportsman in the field. Here must I censure (but with 

 respect) that eager spirit which frequently interrupts, and sometimes is 

 fatal to, sport in fox-hunting ; for though I cannot subscribe to the doctrine 

 of my friend ****, ' that a pack of fox-hounds would do better without a 

 huntsman than with one, and that, if left to themselves, they would never 

 lose a fox ' ; yet, allowing them their usual attendants, had he objected only 

 to the sportsmen who follow them, I must have joined issue with him. 

 Whoever has followed hounds, must have seen them frequently hurried 

 beyond the scent ; and whoever is conversant in hunting, cannot but know, 



