46 THE LIFE OF A FOX 



go, and had just turned for the fost time to the 

 right, and was ascending the top of the highest 

 point of the down, when, to my gi-eat joy, I saw 

 the hounds stopping and trying in vain to recover 

 the scent, which was destroyed by my having run 

 through a large flock of sheep. They now could 

 not hunt the scent a step farther, though on the 

 middle of an open down ; and such was the dis- 

 appointment and chagrin occasioned by it to 

 Sebright, that he was heard by a friend of mine to 

 say, that if the squire would give him a thousand a 

 year, he would not stop to hunt a country, where the 

 scent was so soon entirely lost ; and that, until this 

 occurred, nothing in the world would have made 

 him believe that any fox could have run straight 

 away from such a pack as his, under such apparently 

 favourable circumstances. 



I remained till the following season in this part 

 of the country, in a covert belonging to Sir J. 

 Jervoise, called the Markwells, when I was first 

 roused from my slumber by the voice of another 

 huntsman, INIr. Smith,^ Avho at that time hunted his 

 own hounds, known as the Hambeldon pack. It 

 was about one o'clock in the afternoon, in the 

 month of December, and fortunately I prepared 



^ Tlie author. — En. 



