THE AMERICAN FOXHOUND 13 



press it harder, and kill or hole it in half the time a pack of slow 

 trailers and close runners will do it. A pack of this description 

 will not get scattered and thrown out on bad windy days, like a 

 slow trailing and close running pack, for if the slow trailer and 

 close runner gets behind he stays behind and never gets in un- 

 less the pack should make a circle near him, while the hound, 

 his opposite in tyi3e, will throw off his track, tuck his tail and 

 catch up sooner or later. 



Very well do I remember hunting one bright moonlight night 

 (I sometimes hunt at night when my business is such that I 

 cannot hunt in the day-time) striking a fox up on Town Creek. 

 Pauline, a very celebrated hound, bred in Bourbon county, Ky., 

 was up behind. Two hours later, up on Mallard's Creek, twelve 

 miles due east, the bitch passed by me in the road like a gray 

 streak. When the hounds turned back she was with them, 

 crying, with her thin, quavering voice, as if some one was 

 whipping her. A yell went up from the crowd that could have 

 been heard for miles. 



A man to breed and train a good pack of hounds must be born 

 a hunter. He should be familiar with the habits of the fox, 

 and should know in what direction he would be likely to run or 

 trail. When the track is bad, or too cold, he should know 

 where to carry his pack with a likelihood of striking closer to 

 his game. He should keep up with his pack when trailing a fox, 

 and try and get them all in at the start, often though one or 

 more good hounds are left at the jump. He should yell to his 

 hounds but little, but I am well aware there are often times 

 when one's pent up enthusiasm must find utterance. As a rule 

 silence is a very necessary qualification of a successful red fox 

 hunter, one who kill or holes his game in an open, honorable 

 chase. The man who sits on a runway for hours to shoot a fox, 

 I do not think much of. To my mind he seems to have a viti- 

 ated taste. I do not see any sport, profit or pleasure in a dead 

 fox killed with a shot-gun. In the South we are as careful of 

 the lives of our foxes as we are of our pocket-books. We never 

 kill one if we can save him. I suppose if I had been educated to 

 hunt foxes with a shot-gun I would do so, but I haven't. 



When raising puppies give them plenty to eat. Let them grow 

 into large strong dogs, though there is such a thing as having a 

 foxliound too big. I do n-ot like to feed meat or beef scraps 

 altogether. It makes the puppy too gross and "beefy." Down 



