THE NOBLE SCIENCE. 227 



never kill another fox ! " — it is surely matter of surprise 

 that, with his information concerning the state of the 

 scent, he had not also acquired a hint, as touching any 

 obstructions to his free entrance at the front door of his 

 family mansion, during his temporary absence at his 

 suburban villa. " Yet this one would have gone to 

 ground, five minutes after being found, if he could." 

 Why, if he would not, where is the use of an earth- 

 stopper ? It would have been far more remarkable, 

 had he attempted to go to ground at the end oi ffUj 

 minutes, as a fox, when thus heated, will frequently 

 refuse an open earth ; but, when first found, his point is 

 almost invariably to the head of earths, which, of course, 

 are stopped. It may, very probably, be imagined, if not 

 noticed, that the scent was good ; for it is no impro- 

 bable conclusion, relating to a run of sixteen miles ; but 

 that a fox must, of course, be aware of this circumstance, 

 is to say, that, " Who drives fat oxen, must himself be 

 fat." 



It may be fact within the experience of Mr. Smith, 

 ^' that on many days, when hounds cannot find, and on 

 which days the scent has been proved to be capital, 

 that foxes are under ground ;" though I am at a loss 

 to guess how he reconciles this opinion with that given 

 in his chapter on Earth-stopping, wherein he says, that 

 *' most foxes almost always lay under ground, in bad 

 "weather particularly ;" and I must say, that, according 



