FOX-HUNTING IN NEW ENGLAND 39 



fills their hearts. After tramping since early- 

 morning over miles of the likeliest "starting- 

 places" without finding any trail but cold and 

 scentless ones made in the early night, and so old 

 that the dogs cannot work them out, as the hunter 

 takes his way in the afternoon through some piece 

 of woodland, his hounds, as discouraged as he, 

 with drooping tails and increased sorrow in their 

 sad faces, plodding dejected at heel or ranging 

 languidly, it is a happy surprise to have them halt. 

 With raised muzzles and half-closed eyes, they 

 snuff the air, then draw slowly up wind with ele- 

 vated noses, till they are lost to sight behind gray 

 trunks and mossy logs and withered brakes, and 

 then, with a crashing flourish of trumpets, they 

 announce that at last a fox has been found, traced 

 to his lair by a breeze-borne aroma so subtle that 

 the sense which detects it is a constant marvel. A 

 fox started so late in the day seems loath to leave 

 his wood, and is apt to play there till a shot gives 

 hunter and hounds their reward. 



When one sees in the snow the intricate wind- 

 ings and crossings and recrossings of the trail of 

 a mousing fox, he can but wonder how any dog 

 by his nose alone can untangle such a knotted 

 thread till it shall lead him to the place where the 

 fox has laid up for the day; yet this a good hound 

 will unerringly do if the scent has not become too 

 cold. To see him do this and to follow all his care- 



