166 HORSES AND HOUNDS. 



it,' replied tlie student. ' The deuce you do ; then here goes for 

 an ass,' and he kicked young spiiptonis down stairs. So, gen- 

 tlemen, by the same rule, our foxes must become sea-fishermen 

 as well as deer-stalkers." 



Much applause followed the farmer's storj^, although not a 

 very 7iew one ; and these sayings and doings being repeated at 

 head-quarters, did not fail to extort a reprieve for the foxes, and 

 we never heard any more of their aldermanic feasts. Ridicule 

 will tell where remonstrance fails. I shall, perhaps, be told of 

 the quantity of hen pheasants taken off their nests, which are 

 always laid by the keeper to the charge of his rival. It may 

 not be generally known that, by a wise ordination of Pro- 

 vidence, whose care is evident over all his works, that very 

 little scent belongs to birds when sitting on their eggs, the heat 

 of their bodies being attracted downwards to their nest. Two 

 seasons ago, I had a partridge sitting on seventeen eggs, within 

 twenty yards of a wagon track, which led to the farm-yard ; 

 and, although I passed close by the nest almost daily, with 

 several dogs, they were never attracted to the spot, and the bird 

 hatched all her eggs. 



Foxes are by no means heavy feeders, half a rabbit generally 

 sufficing for their single meal, and, as they do not indulge in 

 breakfast, dinner, and supper, however many bad names may 

 be given to them, they are free from the charge of gluttony. 

 When more food falls in their way than they can make use of 

 at this one meal, it is carefully stowed away in a hole scratched 

 in the earth, and covered over for another night. On my first 

 keeping fox-hounds, I thought more of preserving foxes than 

 game, and our home coverts near the kennels were kept quiet, 

 to ensure us plenty of foxes, for cub-hunting and bye-days. I 

 had one keeper only, who was not allowed to cany a gun, and 

 his chief business was to look to the earths, and keep up the 

 wood hounds. Under this man, foxes, pheasants, and other 

 game increased pari j^xxssu. In one season I had no less than 

 four litters of foxes bred and reared in an extent of small 

 coverts, not exceeding a hundred acres. Twenty or thirty hares 

 might be counted out at feed in one field, as many pheasants, 

 and rabbits innumerable. 



When the kennels were removed, these coverts fell into other 

 hands, and their present possessor, as a novus homo generally 

 does, when first becoming a landed proprietor, commenced a 

 vigorous war (with the assistance of a man, said to be a su])erior 

 keeper) against vermin of every description, foxes included, by 

 trapping and poisoning, right and left indiscriminately, all that 

 came in his way. Neither did he stop short in shooting his 



