Hunting Lore. 459 



as : " Rid out with my gun " ; " went pheasant hunting " ; 

 " went ducking," and " went a gunning up the Creek." But 

 far more often they are : " Rid out with my hounds," " went 

 a fox hunting," or "went a hunting." In their perfect 

 simplicity and good faith they are strongly characteristic 

 of the man. He enters his blank days and failures as 

 conscientiously as his red-letter days of success ; recording 

 with equal care on one day, " Fox hunting with Captain 

 Posey catch a Fox," and another, " Went a hunting with 

 Lord Fairfax . . . catched nothing." 



Occasionally he began as early as August and contin- 

 ued until April ; and while he sometimes made but eight 

 or ten hunts in a season, at others he made as many in a 

 month. Often he hunted from Mt. Vernon, going out 

 once or twice a week, either alone or with a party of his 

 friends and neighbors ; and again he would meet with 

 these same neighbors at one of their houses, and devote 

 several days solely to the chase. The country was still 

 very wild, and now and then game was encountered with 

 which the fox-hounds proved unable to cope ; as witness 

 entries like: "found both a Bear and a Fox, but got 

 neither " ; " went a hunting . . . started a Deer & then a 

 Fox but got neither"; and "Went a hunting and after 

 trailing a fox a good while the Dogs Raized a Deer & ran 

 out of the Neck with it & did not some of them at least 

 come home till the next day." If it was a small animal, how- 

 ever, it was soon accounted for. " Went a Hunting . . . 

 catched a Rakoon but never found a Fox." 



The woods were so dense and continuous that it was 

 often impossible for the riders to keep close to the hounds 



