CONCERNING KENNELS 179 



wire-netting, well railed up. In order to guard against 

 accidents, it is necessary that the kennel doors should 

 be carefully closed, and bolts, which a servant must 

 stop to fasten, are recommended in place of ordinary 

 latches. A good sized feeding-house is preferable 

 to feeding hounds outside the kennels. Here are 

 placed the troughs, which in some establishments are 

 made with perforated covers, which, when let down, 

 afford a seat for the men. The boiling-house should 

 be placed at one end of the building or even a little 

 apart, with a yard of its own, if expense and conveni- 

 ence will allow it. This building should be especially 

 well ventUated, so as to allow of the escape of steam. 

 In it are placed two large boilers, preferably of cast- 

 iron, set in brickwork. One of these serves for meat, 

 the other for meal. The size depends, of course, 

 much upon the strength of your pack. A boUer of 

 fifty or sixty gallons suffices for a fair sized pack of 

 foxhounds (forty couples). Coolers, six or eight feet 

 in length, by four or five feet wide and one foot in 

 depth, stand in the boiling-house. This part of the 

 building will, of course, be floored with brick, or, 

 preferably, asphalt or cement, and a drain inserted 

 for the passage of blood, water, &c. In some kennels 

 it is so arranged that, as the hounds come in from 

 hunting, they pass to the feeding-room through a 

 shallow foot-bath filled with warm broth, the effect 

 of this bath being that they spend some time there- 

 after in licking their feet, and so healing their wounds 

 and cleansing themselves at the same time. A 

 bucket of hot broth to the same quantity of cold 

 water is about the usual proportion of the bath mix- 

 ture. With some of the larger and more imposing 

 packs of harriers, it may be thought necessary to 

 follow the foxhound plan and have a spare hunting 



