FOXES FOXHOUNDS & FOX-HUNTING 



it is to account for the stout hill-foxes, a plentiful 

 supply of which is to be found on the neighbour- 

 ing fells. The pack serves a dual purpose, i.e., 

 to keep down foxes in the interests of the flock- 

 masters, and to provide sport for local hunting 

 people. 



A big hill-fox, one of the kind described by an 

 eminent naturalist as " fierce as a tiger, long as 

 a hay-band, and with an admirable cast of 



features like the Chancellor of the Exchequer ," 



can do a lot of damage amongst the lambs in 

 spring, when there is a family of cubs to feed. 

 Hence the Ullswater are in great demand during 

 the Spring season, and they account for many a 

 May fox. Hounds are kennelled early in the 

 year, but in summer they are sent out to walk 

 on the fell farms, a couple or two generally going 

 to augment one or other of the neighbouring otter 

 hound packs ; for many of them can give quite 

 as good an account of themselves when hunting 

 the " sly goose-footed prowler " as they do when 

 in pursuit of their legitimate quarry. 



A visit to the Ullswater kennels, in the company 

 of Joe Bowman, the veteran huntsman, who has 

 carried the horn since 1879, is an education in 

 itself ; for what Joe with his long experience of 

 hounds and foxes does not know about fell hunting 

 is not worth knowing. As hounds come down 

 off the sleeping bench, and parade in the kennel 

 yard a hunting man from the Shires may be for- 

 given if he shows some surprise at the type on 

 which he is setting eyes for the first time. They 

 are a very different stamp from that to which he 

 has been accustomed in the low country. 



To begin with, hounds are light built, and 

 hare-footed, otherwise they could not travel at 

 speed over their rough country ; they are light- 



262 



