SCIENCE OF FOXHUNTING. 61 



kennels, some few years ago, a cross between the 

 foxhound and bloodhound — by their then master, 

 Mr. Baker — upon which Peter Collison, now hunts- 

 man to the Cheshire, pinned his faith, as the most 

 efficient hounds in the pack, quite equal in speed 

 and quickness to any others, and showing better 

 nose than the majority. We quite agree with all 

 masters and sticklers for purity of blood, in what 

 we now call thorough -bred foxhounds, that they 

 can and wUl hunt, if left to themselves, a very 

 cold scent ; and we are free to confess that they 

 owe this property to their original bloodhound 

 strain ; and, as we have before remarked, that that 

 strain is exhibited in the difference of shape of 

 head, and length of ear peculiar to the bloodhound 

 — others, again, going back to the father's side, 

 the deerhound, in thinness of head, smallness of 

 ear, and depth of chest. Naturain expellas furca, 

 tamen usque recurret. In proof of this, we may 

 state that some thirty years ago we received, in an 

 unentered draft from the late Sir Thomas Mostyn's 

 kennel, who then hunted the Bicester country, a 

 hound which he called Yarico, resembling a blood- 

 hound in every particular, as to colour, shape, and 

 other points ; and on consulting Tom Wingfield, the 

 huntsman, he assured us no such blood had ever 

 been introduced within his recollection into their 

 kennel. 



Having always a partiality for large hounds, and 

 being acquainted with the masters as well as hunts- 

 men of the most celebrated packs in those times, 

 we had opportunities of picking up occasionally 



