288 THE MEYNELL HOUNDS. [189» 



beyond an occasional cheer, and a note on the horn to keep them going, as they 

 hunted along on the left of the Abbots Bromley road, till they reached the road 

 which boars off left-handed for Blithbury, and beyond which lies a section of 

 coimtry right for homicide, bristling with wire, and decorated with the scarlet 

 brand of shame. 



"Remember, fair sportsmen fair usage require, 

 So up with the timber and down with the wire." 



Luckily our fox to-day saved our necks and our tempers by turning left-handed 

 by Bromley Hurst, where there were two lines, and we may have changed. Be 

 that as it may, the hounds ran their fox, whichever it might be, left-handed by 

 Gilleon's Hall, nearly to Rough Park, over a nice country without any wire to 

 speak of, unless you looked for it, and then turned left-handed back by Hoar 

 Cross into the Birch Wood again, whence they started, after hunting him about 

 forty minutes. Two foxes — for a wonder said to be fresh ones — were viewed 

 over the Newborough road, and it was probably the line of their hunted fox 

 which they got on to, and followed past the Hoar Cross end of Chantry Wood 

 in the direction of the Brakenhurst. But their fox, even if he was not the hunted 

 one, was at any rate a very short-running customer, so, turning back, he 

 zig-zagged by Hoar Cross back into Birch Wood agaua. Hounds carried the line 

 straight throu,ii;h and out on tlie far side, crossing the httle brook and the New- 

 borough-Broraley road. For a few fields they ran briskly, and then checked- 

 They made a beautiful cast on their own account, and a couple and a half seemed 

 to have hit the line forward towards Field House Coppice. But the body of the 

 pack failed to endorse it, and the fox was given up after a nice hunting; run of an 

 hour and twenty minutes. They found again in Nichol's Wood at Hoar Cross,, 

 and ran across to the Brakenhurst, and, after a turn or two up and down and 

 round about the wood, with frequent checks and a bad scent, they hunted him 

 through Jackson's Bank and into the open — the same line that he took the last 

 time they were here — in the direction of Moat Hall. The leading hounds took a 

 line forward — one hound, in fact, going on into Chantry Wood — but the main 

 body turned back again into the Brakenhurst, right through it to Yoxall, on to 

 Scotch Hills, and so on to Vicarage Wood, Rangemore, where they lost him. 



Monday, February 20th, 1899, Cubley Stoop. A wild, rough morning, and 

 an " idle " wind did not augur well for scent, nor did subsequent events falsify the 

 augury. As a matter of fact, it is generally fairly safe to prophesy a poor scent, 

 for unluckily there are far more bad scenting days than good ones. To-day 

 proved no exception to the rule, for hounds could never really run a faint-hearted 

 fox, who, after hanging in the gorse as long as possible, never went far from it.. 

 Returning to shelter, he paid the penalty of his lack of proper spirit, and died 

 ignominiously — a warning, it is to be hoped, to others of like kidney. A good fox, 

 going best pace down-wind, would probably have run them out of scent and 

 escaped scot-free. Just as this fox was killed another was halloaed away, and 

 hounds ran him, with an indifferent scent, up to the Snelston-Norbury road. 

 They then turned left-handed and lost him near Raddle Wood. They drew 

 Raddle Wood, Hope Wood, and all the Snelston coverts blank, and were then^ 

 trotted off" to Bentley Car. A fox was soon on foot, and broke covert at the 

 Bentley brickyard end. Turning left-handed over the brook one field from the 

 Car, he ran up the hill to Alkmonton school, and then turned back into the Car 

 again. But the hounds stuck to him, and, pushing him througli the wood, ran 

 him fast down the hill pointing for Cubley. Leaving Bentley Hall on the right 



