HORSES AND HOUNDS. 281 



if I thought it worth while to keep them at all. For this pur- 

 pose I should get together some young unentered fox-hounds 

 and a few of .the old blue mottled southerns, and then model a 

 pack to my fancy. 



As soon as the corn is harvested hare-hunting may com- 

 mence, but sport of course cannot be exj^ected thus early. As in 

 the cub-hunting season, this is the time to break in and blood 

 the young hounds, and if the country is an inclosed one, and 

 hares tolerably plentiful, you will soon catch hares enough for 

 this purpose, and some to spare. Harriers to be good must be 

 kept in good heart and blood, and all the hares they kill in a 

 day must not be reserved for currant-jelly sauce at home. 

 When hares are chopped by them, these may be taken away ; 

 but when they have earned their game by a good run it should 

 never be taken from them, or your hounds will soon becomxC slack 

 and indifferent in their work. Our old pack were expert 

 carvers, in which they were duly encouraged by their master, 

 and it required a pretty quick hand to get a hare out of their 

 clutches. This, as first whipper-in, I never troubled my head 

 about, unless upon some very particular occasion, when a lady 

 had expressed a wish for a hunted one. The farmers who 

 joined us always had the hare, if they could save her, and it 

 was great fun to me to see how they would puff and blow away, 

 and cram their horses at desperate places, when the hounds 

 were running into their game ; but if old Workman (a large 

 blue mottled hound, with a mouth as wide as an alligator) once 

 caught hold of poor puss, the currant-jelly was saved for that 

 dressing at least. 



Views should be avoided as much as possible, but in drawing 

 for your game over open ground, or in beating hedge-rows, they 

 will occur. It is advisable in beating hedges to get them tried 

 by some man on foot or horseback before the hounds ; there is 

 not much risk then of a hare being chopped, and you can lay 

 the hounds on quietly when she is out of sight. A j)ack of 

 harriers, to deserve the name, should be kept strictly to their 

 own game. Neither should they be allowed to hunt either fox, 

 red deer, or red herring — they then become a lot of curs, and 

 are fit for nothing. Although often longing for a gallop in my 

 younger days after Mr. Eeynard, the governor was inexorable 

 on this point, and never would admit of the least deviation 

 from our legitimate drama. 



Upon one occasion we had, during the vacation, got a fox 

 sent down from Oxford as a treat, and had calculated upon 

 turning him down at the end of a small covert, hallooing the 

 hounds away, and giving the governor the slip : but our plans 



