148 HUNTING. 



noses than the others, stop and try to puzzle out the scent. The 

 whipper-in should not then interfere with thern. He should leave 

 them, and putting the others on to the huntsman, watch them. 

 If he finds they are feathering on the line, he should encourage 

 them and call the huntsman's attention to them. As a rule 

 directly a whipper-in sees hounds doing this he rides at, rates, 

 or hits them, any way drives them on. It never seems to 

 strike a whipper-in that hounds come out to use their noses, 

 and to hunt a fox ! In countries where foxes lie out much in 

 hedgerows or in trees, in trotting from one covert to another 

 you may move a fox without anyone seeing him. Should 

 you cross his line, directly hounds put their noses down and 

 begin to speak to it, or to quicken their pace, without even 

 looking or considering whether it is a hound given to rioting 

 or a staunch foxhound that will hunt nothing else, bang goes the 

 whipper-in at them, with voice and whip to stop them. ]\Iy ex- 

 perience is that with very few exceptions nine days out of ten that 

 a whipper-in goes out hunting he does more harm than good. 



I persistently call these men ' whippers-in,' agreeing with 

 the late Earl Fitzhardinge that it is the proper name for that 

 species of kennel servant, that a whip is a thing you carry in 

 your hand, and not a man on horseback. 



I dare say I have omitted many things I ought to have 

 noticed, but at the present time the only other hint I should give 

 is that whips in the kennel cannot be too short or too light, as 

 many hounds have been seriously injured across the back by 

 the use of the usual heavy whips served out. 



THE DUTIES OF A KENNEL HUNTSMAN. 

 In the ordinary case of a professional huntsman being en- 

 gaged, he must have under him either a man of experience 

 whom he can trust to feed the hounds properly when he is 

 away from home (though generally that can be done before 

 he starts for his day's duty), and to look after lame and sick 

 hounds, or he must have an intelligent young man who will 

 obey orders and carry out the instructions given to him. This 



