BREEDING AND HUNTING OF FOXHOUNDS. 101 



the covers in the Vale of Berkeley, disturbing all 

 foxes within liearing, got them (the keepers) 

 '^ blown Tip" if their covers did not hold a second 

 fox. Osbaldiston was famed for this operatic or 

 musical ^^ropensity, which made the fast Pytchly 

 wits of his day compose the following couplet : — 



" This is the man just come from ^ Qiiorn,' 

 Who lost the fox by blowing his horn." 



And he and that over-rated man, his huntsman, 

 Jack Stephens, the latter told me so in the woods 

 '' tvhere the best echoes ^t;ere," that those were the 

 places where he and his old master used to try the 

 tones of their horns in going home, while the poor, 

 dear hounds, who had been running all day, were 

 trotting contemptuously at their heels, and getting 

 tired of their music. 



As to whippers-in, there are many of them that 

 I have seen not fit to be trusted with a whip, for 

 they seem to do little else than ride behind their 

 huntsman and cut at every hound who is unfor- 

 tunately put, by necessity or accident, within their 

 reach. 



I remember one day overhearing George Carter, 

 then my first whii3per-in, say to one of his men 

 who had struck a hound, — 



