288 HORSES AND HOUNDS. 



wide shot in asserting that a fox is supplied from his victualling 

 department alone. 



Some game-preservers appear to me to be labouring under an 

 attack of foxoj)hob la, which has infected their whole system, 

 and look u})on Mr. Wiley as a rampant and roaring lion, walk- 

 ing about their preserves from morning till night, with his 

 mouth wide open, seeking how many pheasants and hares he 

 can devour; or perhaps they recollect a certain funny little 

 picture which excited their particular attention when children, 

 in which a fox is represented as sitting under a tree with his 

 mouth open, expecting a cock which is perched on the top, to 

 fall into it as a matter of course. They should have seen also 

 the answer put into the mouth of this said cock by a wag to 

 this polite invitation to fall into the fox's open jaws and be 

 eaten — " / tvish you may get it."" Pheasants are at roost when 

 foxes begin their evening rambles, and few would suppose a 

 fox such an ass as to sit under a tree half the night with his 

 mouth wide open in the vague expectation of a pheasant drop- 

 ping into it. 



A letter has been forwarded to me, signed " An Old Fox- 

 hunter," part of which I will transcribe, although it may be cal- 

 culated to draw forth another shot from Mr. Ramrod : — 



" I have at this moment in my eye a keeper of this descrip- 

 tion ; the fellow sometimes shows a litter of cubs the first time 

 the hounds draw his coverts, but after that, if hounds run into 

 them, or draw them unexpectedly, there is no more symptoms 

 of a fox than if the animal had never existed. Let the fixture 

 be somewhere for the express purpose of drawing this man's 

 coverts, and there is scarcely a more sure find within the pre- 

 cincts of the hunt ; no danger of changing foxes, however — no 

 second fox. Now, really, as a matter of curiosity, I shall be 

 greatly obliged if ' Scrutator' will do me the favour to enlighten 

 me as to this fellow's plan of operations. We don't hear of his 

 importing foxes by the rail ; in the old coaching days (for I 

 have known him long) he did not have them down by those 

 conveyances. Does he borrow a fox of his neighbour *? does he 

 drag them to his coverts % if he did, we should sometimes find a 

 brace of foxes on his ground. Does he bottle, or rather barn 

 his foxes, like a good liousekeeper, ' for use when wanted ? In 

 fact, what does he do T 



The trick practised by this old artful keeper is a stale one to 

 me, as I have often known it adopted by these velveteen gentry. 

 From the facts above stated, there can be very little doubt that 

 this man is a regular fox-destroyer, and the more dangerous 

 because he is apparently a fox-preserver, He attempts to 



