202 CUB-HUNTING 



of game coverts and non-hunting proprietors 

 are unwilling very often to encourage foxes 

 or to have litters on their places if a fair 

 proportion are not killed. In such a country 

 as this, even when, owing to an early harvest 

 or absence of arable land, a start is made 

 in August, cub-hunting may be cub-hunting 

 and cub-killing all the time up to the end 

 of October. In other hunts, after a week 

 or two's cubbing, hunting may be very much 

 the same as after the opening day, the scarlet 

 coat and top-boot alone marking the transi- 

 tion. The conduct of the huntsman will 

 not be so much actuated by blood-thirstiness, 

 as by the wish to discover where there are 

 foxes, to give the cubs a little instruction 

 in going away, and hounds a few lessons 

 of how to behave in the open. He will not, 



