HORSES AXD HOUNDS. 301 



not being continued, I presume it has been in otlier cases, as 

 with mine, a failure. When we can alter the nature of foxes, it 

 may succeed, and not before. The natural home of most foxes 

 lies in the bowels of the earth, the refuge they always seek when 

 hunted by hounds, and the general nursery of their cubs. 

 There are, it is true, some clay countries, where earths are less 

 frequent, and where foxes both lie and breed above ground, but 

 these are the exceptions to the general rule. In all soils which 

 rest upon sand, gravel, or rock, earths abound, and foxes for 

 generations past have been accustomed to harbour in them. 



Having one part of my country very much infested with fox 

 stealers, I resolved to do away with all the earths in that locality, 

 and accordingly having taken all due precaution in stopping 

 them up, I kept them in this state for two or three seasons ; but 

 I lost more foxes by poachers by this plan than the other. 

 Earths they would and did find in less secure situations, and 

 we often had blank days by their resorting to places which we 

 knew nothing of. In one particular covert, which had always 

 pre\dously held foxes, we did not find one for some time during 

 the winter months, but on one fine day in the spring of the 

 year, we unkennelled a leash, almost together, which went 

 straight away, and ran to ground some miles distant, in a bank 

 close to a large town, which we had never before heard of as 

 containing earths ; this place also was well tarred first and then 

 stopped. They then led us a dance to other out-of-the-way 

 places, and finding their determination to seek refuge some- 

 where underground, I was obliged to re-open all the main 

 earths nearer home, and keep them continually cleared out. 

 There were also some very favourite woods for foxes, in which 

 were some large rock earths in the neighbouring country ; these 

 owing to their distance from the kennels were ordered to be 

 kept stopped during the season ; the consequence was, that few 

 foxes were found there afterwards ; many, I am satisfied, from 

 the carelessness of the earth-stoppers, were stopped in, and 

 starved to death ; and others, I also know, went away to coverts 

 belonging to a fox-killing game preserver, and there met an 

 ignominious fate. Foxes, like cats, have an instinctive attach- 

 ment to the places of their birth, but when continually forced 

 from their homes, both above and below ground, will seek other 

 abodes free from molestation. Drains, old rabbit-burrows and 

 such places, are then resorted to, from which, when discovered, 

 they may be more easily taken. I remember upon one occasion 

 running a fox, after a severe chase, into an old lime-kiln, from 

 which he was easily extracted, and whilst the hounds were kill' 



