1 40 FOX-HUNTING 



punishment administered at the right moment 

 will bring the sinner to see the error of his 

 ways. Independence, which is a virtue in a man, 

 is a deadly sin in a hound, and, as I have already 

 said, very frequently is the result of being allowed 

 to hunt at walk. 



I think I have said elsewhere that a whip should 

 never hit a hound unnecessarily, but there is no 

 harm in repeating the advice here. Punishment 

 should be for the purpose of curing some fault, 

 and unless the offender knows for what he is 

 being hit, the act is one of sheer cruelty. Whips, 

 I am afraid, are often rather thoughtless in this 

 respect, and they also fail to measure the severity 

 of the stroke in accordance with the seriousness 

 of the offence. I dislike seeing a hound get the 

 full swing of the lash from an expert arm, for 

 some trivial fault that a light touch or stroke 

 would have been adequate to reprove. 



Foxes very often use the same smeuses as 

 hares, and the whip must therefore not jump to 

 the conclusion that hounds are running a hare 

 because one is in front of them. On these 

 occasions he must ride close up to them, and by 

 carefully watching the old hounds he will be 



