386 The Hunting Countries of England. 



where the water has cut its way from the upper ground, 

 we find the sides of the burns widely clad with covert 

 from moor to sea. 



The ironstone mines on the hillside, besides the 

 intrusion of their presence, provide another incon- 

 venience in the opportunity they offer to foxes for 

 getting to ground. Clefts, holes, and cavities exist 

 in such profusion that any attempt at earth stopping- 

 would be a farce — and so disappointment is often 

 only the result of a hard run. Among the qualities 

 most needed for a hound in this country is, besides 

 nose and tongue, that of drawing covert carefully 

 and perseveringly ; for foxes will hide up very closely 

 under the banks and rocks, and often decline to 

 move until bundled out of their kennel. The supply 

 of foxes is, generally speaking, an ample one ; and, 

 while the scent on the cultivated ground is often good, 

 it seldom fails to be strong on the heather. 



Nor is fox preserving by any means confined to large 

 covert-owners or landowners. The tenant farmers are 

 still as friendly to the sport as they were in the days 

 when the Cleveland was entirely a farmer^s pack ; and 

 the small field (seldom more than twenty-five or thirty 

 in number) is almost entirely composed of them and 

 the resident gentlemen. The neighbouring towns, 

 wealth-producing, dusty, and grimy as they are, 

 scarcely constitute pleasant residences for those whose 

 income they provide ; and so they send but few 

 representatives into the hunting field. The Kedcar 

 Kennels, by the way, though by no means palatial 

 either as to situation or architecture (being some 

 adapted buildings bound closely in between railways 



