SCENT AND SMELL C0NTI?ASTI:D. 305 



CHAPTER XI. 



SCENT AND SMELL CONTRASTED. 



Uncertainty of Scent — From What does it Arise? — Difficulties of 

 the Subject — Scent in Hounds not the same as Smell — The 

 " Drag " — Gossamer unfavourable to Scent — Good Huntsman, 

 Good Hounds — Mr. Asliton Smith and the Curate — Remark- 

 able Faculty of Scent in my Bloodhound Druid. 



This is a subject wliicli, up to the present time, has 

 baffled all our ideas as to what the '' scent " (the 

 line of scent as hunted by hounds or dogs) of 

 bird or beast may he, and how or in what way it 

 differs from those ^^ smells" of various descriptions, 

 sweet flowers, artificial perfumes, or tlie malaria 

 of drains, &c. &c., which are palpable to the nose 

 of man. What it is that governs the scent of deer, 

 fox, hare, or birds of game, and renders it, as the 

 huntsman says, '^breast high" on one day, cold 

 and close only to the ground another day, and 

 perchance on the next day no scent at all, is to 

 my mind utterly beyond conception. 



VOL. I. X 



