332 HUNTING PRELIMINARIES. 



Melton Mowbray, informs me that during his long career as 

 a large farmer in Kent, he met with several cases of the 

 successful reformation of such animals, by catching them, if 

 possible red-handed ; tying them up very short ; and beating 

 them unmercifully with their dead victim. They should of 

 course be severely " rated " at the same time. This method of 

 correction accomplished its object so well with a valuable setter 

 which Mr. Head owned, that ever afterwards the sight of a sheep 

 of any age was so appalling to the dog, that if he met one when 

 out for a walk, he would run back to his kennel with all possible 

 speed. I have also heard that tying the dead lamb or fowl to 

 the collar of a dog and allowing it to remain on until it drops 

 off, as a result of putrefaction, is effective. A good old plan 

 with a sheep-worrying dog is to put him into a room or loose 

 box with a combative ram. If we adopt this expedient, we 

 must not repeat the error committed by a Master in confining 

 his hounds along with a fighting ram, who amused himself by 

 playing a game of nine-pins with the hounds as long as 

 the Master was looking on. Happy in the apparent suc- 

 cess of the experiment, he went to luncheon, and on his 

 return was shocked to find that the only things which 

 remained of the ram were a pair of horns, a good 

 deal of wool, and a few bones. Any of these corrective 

 methods would of course be useless with a sheep-worrying 

 sheepdog, unless the animal was to be put to other 

 work. 



I am greatly obliged to Mr. Head for having, on my behalf, 

 made enquiries among his farming friends respecting the 

 manner in which foxes devour young lambs. The results 

 of these investigations, and of his own experience, show 

 that a fox as a rule begins breaking it up at the groin, 

 and pulls out and eats the intestines, of which foxes are 

 particularly fond. Mr. Head found that when he placed 

 butchers' offal near coverts for young cubs, the vixen 



