A MASTER OF OTTERHOUNDS 239 



criticise and find fault in field or in kennel, though it 

 may safely be said that very few otter hunt committees 

 really represent either the owners of water or the 

 majority of the subscribers. Every rule, of course, has 

 its exceptions, and my own personal experience has 

 embraced every help and kindness from some members 

 of some committees. 



Then the Master has other troubles in kennel. These 

 will arise out of such obligations as selecting and 

 building proper kennels for the pack, seeing to their 

 health and comfort as later they will see to his sport 

 and enjoyment. The Master may proceed to his 

 duties under a variety of conditions. In some cases, 

 he may take a country and find a good pack ready to 

 his hand. Or, again, he may buy an entire pack and 

 then take a country for it to hunt. As a third case, he 

 may take the country and find a lot of hounds in 

 kennel, with no clue whatever as to their work. There 

 is then nothing for it but " to find them out," often at 

 the expense of time and temper and, indeed, of derision 

 from carping critics. To make the pack an efficient 

 one, he must add other hounds, rough or smooth as the 

 case may be, and he must then enter them. This 

 means first finding an otter, by no means a certainty 

 even under the most likely conditions. Lastly, he has 

 to weld these various elements into one homogeneous 

 whole, a machine, in fact, that can be controlled by 

 one man's voice, horn and gesture, and that man the 

 Master himself. A single instance from my own 

 memories may serve to illustrate some worries of an 

 M.O.H. The Cheriton were in the middle of their 



