CHAPTER XIV 



BLANK DAYS, ODD DAYS, AND A RECORD DAY 



" Who -w hoop ! they have hi?n, they're round him, how 

 They worry and tear when he s down ! 

 ^Twas a stout hill fox when they found him, now 

 ' Tis a hundred tatters of brown ! " 



— Whyte-Melville. 



IT was an infinite satisfaction, and it had begun to 

 be my boast, that we seldom had a blank day. 

 Often did we draw a good big tract of country in 

 the spring months, when vixens were below ground 

 and dog foxes were lying out in the open, without 

 finding, and often when things were looking hopeless, 

 a fox would discover himself in the most unlikely and 

 unusual spot and provide a good hunt or a fast gallop 

 as the case might be. And even if we had only a 

 short scurry with an ^^ interesting " vixen, whom we 

 speedily put to ground and as speedily left, or if we 

 slowly followed the short turnings of an anxious 

 and crafty old dog fox, till, under cover of night and 

 failing scent, he beat us, there was always some 

 fun to enjoy and some amusing incident on which 

 to look back. Though it was in the first days that 

 the most droll occurrences happened and the most 

 novel situations arose. 



One day, an alert-looking little man was seen 

 to dismount and hold open the gate from a turnip- 

 field to allow a somewhat strung out line of riders 



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