Auld Lang Syne. 331 



noon, when the fly was off them, no hounds would hunt 

 better; but, as we all know, in the afternoon the 

 bloom is off then men, horses, and hounds have had 

 their first sweat, and the only one of the party who is 

 fresh is the fox. You may hunt him till dark, but if 

 he be good for aught you will never grab him. After 

 the old Duke's death, the late Lord Southampton 

 took them, and Tom Rose continued to hunt them. 

 They were kept much in the same form, and with the 

 same result : in short, he killed his foxes in the wood- 

 lands, and they beat him in the open. 



His lordship's great delight was to breed them 

 stout, and if ever a hound tired he never took him out 

 again. He had a hound called Dragon, the wildest 

 and the stoutest hound that ever hunted. When he 

 was running for his fox at the end of a long day, you 

 might see him with his head up, waving his stern, and 

 throwing himself into a wood as fresh as if he had 

 just come out. After Lord Southampton's death, the 

 late Duke took them, and old Tom hunted them till 

 he was obliged to give it up. His son hunted them 

 for a short time, and then they fell into the hands of 

 George Carter. George tried, and succeeded in a 

 great degree, in making them an open country pack : 

 he got out of the woods whenever he could, drafted 

 the skylarkers, and, though he never got them steady, 

 he killed his foxes. He could not kill a bad fox, like 

 Tom Rose with his wild-boys, but he was the first 

 man in that country who could ever catch a good one 

 over the open. 



In our passing records of the chase we must not 

 forget the redoubtable Jack Musters. Hunting was 

 his study and delight, and no man knew more about 

 it. He was as much alive to the wiles of a fox as he 

 was quick in discovering the sagacity of a hound. When 

 his fox was beat, and began to play tricks, no man was 

 so patient, so quiet, or ever killed more often after a 

 run. He had the knack of keeping their heads down ; 



