IN BOOKS AND REAL LIFE 203 



poacher's lurcher is seldom pure bred ; he is a 

 cross between the greyhound — the least intelligent 

 of dogs — and the collie, and I have a great belief 

 in pure breeding. But he lives with his master ; 

 he is with him night and day, and he becomes such 

 a finished hypocrite, that he might give points to 

 the most accomplished area sneak. His hang-dog 

 or furtive look he cannot help, but if any one 

 glances at him suspiciously, he is the incarnation 

 of injured innocence. His hunting — and lurchers 

 almost always hunt in couples — is the perfection 

 of dodgy strategy. He knows he is raiding in a 

 hostile country, and with ears and nose he is 

 always on the watch for signs of the enemy. Of 

 course he hunts silent, but on a symptom of danger 

 he slinks into the nearest ditch, and works back 

 under the cover of weeds and brambles to his 

 master. If there is no trouble, while the one dog 

 beats the field, the other is on the watch by the 

 hedge at the familiar hare or pheasant run. But 

 it is when his master has made a good haul by net 

 or snare that the serious business begins. The 

 game is to be got off the ground, and the watchers 

 may have taken the alarm, or the rural constable 

 may be taking an early stroll along the lanes. 

 Then the surest of the lurchers is sent off on patrol 

 duty. He trots ahead, as if minding some business 

 of his own, with cocked ears and distended nostrils. 

 I have been told by an old villain, whom I was 

 trying to bring to a sense of the error of his ways, 

 and who used to chuckle over the iniquities he 



