FOXES FOXHOUNDS & FOX-HUNTING 



climb with the greatest ease in crags and among 

 timber. Anthony Chapman, who hunted Mr. 

 Green's hounds, told the writer that on one oc- 

 casion hounds threw up, and eventually the 

 marten was discovered sitting on the limb of a 

 tall birch tree, looking down at his pursuers. A 

 marten has an intense dislike to smoke and 

 will bolt directly the first whiff of burning grass 

 or bracken reaches it. 



In Vyner's " Notitia Venatica " it says regard- 

 ing the marten, " our forefathers were used to 

 enter their hounds to him as by his running the 

 thickest brakes they were taught to turn quickly 

 with a scent and run in covert without skirting. 

 Although in the constant habit of climbing when 

 hunted he will stand sometimes for half-an-hour 

 before hounds with a good scent before treeing, 

 when the following method of dislodging him is 

 frequently practised : — A man climbs part of the 

 way up the tree and holds under him some damp 

 straw or hay which is lighted, immediately on his 

 perceiving the smoke he darts out of the tree and 

 so great is his agility that he will more frequently 

 than not escape through the legs of the hounds 

 that stand baying at him and eagerly watching 

 his descent." The marten affords the best hunt 

 in open country, and for this reason the sport was 

 good on the Lakeland fells. A year or two ago 

 the Coniston hounds marked a fox to ground and 

 on the terriers being sent in a marten bolted. 

 There ensued a brief scuffle, but the mart event- 

 ually beat hounds in a nearby crag. The martens 

 which occasionally come to hand nowadays are 

 generally accounted for by shepherds' dogs, or 

 by the terriers of some hunting dalesman. 



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