A VULPICIDE 97 



hunt, preserve foxes. Still, when a man is not very fond of his 

 game, and has a hen-roost that foxes cannot reach, I think his 

 practice sharp when he murders cubs with a gun, the master of 

 hounds being able and willing to kill them, even in July, if sent 

 for. Mr. Higgins had an old fat keeper who, among the 

 farmers and labouring people, went by rather an indifferent 

 nickname, who never went out after dark, and feared his own 

 shadow by moonlight, portly and unghostlike as it was. This 

 man, and there are hundreds of men called gamekeepers that 

 resemble him, lost all his master's game by poachers and the 

 smaller vermin, and then laid their depredations on the fox. 

 There was no danger in attacking, taking, or killing a fox, so 

 this fellow concentrated all his hatred on that animal, and 

 cruelly punished it, as he would have done by the poachers if 

 he dared. I have frequently run foxes, from Yardley Chase 

 once, and from other places often, up to the premises of Turvey 

 Abbey, and checked, the hounds trying its very doors. Of 

 course, knowing his mood, and not wishing to find Mr. Higgins 

 instead of the fox, the moment they checked I lifted them 

 round the house in vain ! Up to the doors they would go, and 

 no farther ; and I almost thought that the fox was a witch, or 

 that Mr. Higgins was a magician who took the shape of a fox 

 on purpose to be hunted and to draw me into mischief. On 

 one of these occasions, when, as usual, the hounds were knock- 

 ing at the door, some one told me that Mr. Higgins was out ; 

 so I sent in my compliments to ask Mrs. Higgins if I might 

 look into the yard, as I thought the fox was in a drain. While 

 the message was gone in I climbed on a sort of garden wall, and 

 was trying to see as much as I could, when the lady herself 

 appeared and civilly regretted she could not give me leave to 

 search the premises, as Mr. Higgins was so much against hounds, 

 but I might look into any of the drains outside. I had already 

 drawn the hounds over them ; my wish was for the inside of the 

 premises, as I was sure, as on similar occasions I always had been 

 sure, that my hunted fox was left in Turvey Abbey. I sat on 

 the wall and exhausted every topic of conversation, in order to 



H 



