96 THE ETON COLLEGE HUNT. 



using for the purpose of twisting the strands a weight which 

 i? attached to each separate one, and by moving which the 

 necessary degree of twist is imparted, ever taking care to make 

 the twist as slight as possible. A poacher is well aware of the 

 value of an old wire, always provided it is sound and good, 

 preferring it to a new one. The general effect of such a wire 

 when set appears clumsy to an inexperienced eye, but a closer 

 inspection will show the care and skill with which it has been 

 laid. Keepers, as a rule, set wires to catch rabbits or hares for 

 their employers, whereas poachers do so for themselves. On one 

 occasion, when shooting with a friend, we took up some thirty or 

 forty rabbit wires which had been set by a poacher ; and the next 

 day my friend found a basket containing upwards of forty more, 

 all of which he gave to an old man in his employ. Curiously 

 enough, we afterwards discovered that these wires had been set 

 by the grandson of the man to whom they were given, who, of 

 course, was not a little pleased to have his property restored to 

 him. 



Another method of taking hares, adopted by poachers and 

 the lower class of gipsies, is to place a net across a gateway 

 through which hares are known to pass, and then to send a trained 

 lurcher into the adjoining fields to beat up the hare. Calling 

 hares by means of a hare-call, and then suddenly shooting them 

 or suddenly slipping a lurcher on to them, is a plan occasionally 

 pursued. An ordinary tobacco pipe, provided it has a mouth- 

 piece, makes an excellent call-pipe. The call is produced by 

 pressing the mouthpiece against the lips, which must be nearly 

 closed, sucking in the air, placinac the ball of the thumb on the 

 bowl of the pipe, and again quickly removing it. It is easy to 

 produce the required sound with a very little practice. 



The following may interest the reader. On the afternoon of 

 Easter Day 1895, I was walking in the water-meadows in front 

 of my house in company with my wife and a friend who had 

 two well-broken retrievers with him. My wife left us, returning 

 to the house by a bridge which used to span the river intervening 

 between my house and the meadows, and which is at that point 

 some forty or fifty yards in width, the current being at the time 

 strong and deep. For some days previously I had noticed a 

 hare in the meadow, and on this occasion she jumped up some 

 two hundred yards from where we were standing in the centre 

 of the field, raced round the meadow, and eventually made 

 straight for the river. The dogs had remained perfectly steady 

 at heel, though fully aware of what was happening. Without 

 the slightest hesitation she plunged boldly out into the stream, 



