22 NOTITIA VENATICA. 



or deer may be excused at first), should be put back. Hounds which 

 have hunted hi wild mountainous countries are all, more or less, given 

 to the vice of kiUing their OAvn mutton, from the impossibility of a whip- 

 per-in getting at them upon all occasions, and from the frequent and 

 tempting opportunities offered them of pulhng down the small black sheep 

 when unobserved, which bounce out of the ling like a fox ; which they 

 resemble, not only in their wildness, but in the length and shape of their 

 tails. Drafts from such kennels as hunt the Mendip hills, the north of 

 Yorkshire, or the hills between Wales and Shropshire, shoidd be re- 

 garded with a jealous eye. It is not much to be wondered at that 

 hounds hunting some of the above-named districts should acquire vice 

 and wildness. A friend of mine, who was in the habit of hunting some 

 years ago with a pack that had been kept for a length of time, not above 

 a hundred miles from Ludlow, informed me that it frequently happened 

 that, when the hounds ran to the hills, and the men's horses were, from 

 distress, unable to get to them to stop them, when night closed in, the 

 pack were left to their own resources to kill the fox or leave him, just as 

 they liked ; and it very frequently happened that the majority of the 

 hounds did not reach their kennel until the next morning. The most 

 remarkable thing Avas, however, that they invariably returned with their 

 bellies full, having had, Avithout doubt, a plentiful repast of mountain 

 mutton. 



At the commencement of the cub-hunting season, if foxes are very 

 plentiful, the old hounds should be taken out two or three times before 

 the puppies are entered. But here let me remind my readers that I am 

 speaking of a newly-formed pack of hounds. In old-established packs, 

 where the body of old hounds can be depended on, the young entry 

 should be taken out with them from the first morning. During these 

 trials, such as are noisy or wide should he put aAvay decidedly for the 

 first oftence. 



Old hounds Avhich cannot run up, if steady and not noisy, may be ex- 

 tremely useful, at any rate for the first season : and, after the young 

 ones have joined them, no others should be received into the pack, even 

 as presents. No one parts with a hound at that season of the year 

 which is worth a farthing, and new acquaintances invariably create Avild- 

 ness and jealousies ; the constantly rating and flogging those which are 

 Avild and vicious, tend considerably to alarm and disturb those Avhich are 

 already steady, and from shyness and distrust they become themselves 

 reckless and ungovernable. " DimicUuni facti qui bene coepit hahet," 

 is a motto Avhich cannot be too forcibly impressed upon the mind of any 

 one making his debut as a master of hounds. If you have sufticient 

 walks, or quarters, as they are sometimes called, to enable you to breed 

 your own, begin from a good stock at first ; there is plenty of choice ; 

 and bad blood, once introduced, may blight the fruits of your imder- 

 takings for many years to come ; and, above all, remember the Avords of 

 the dying huntsman, " Breed 'em wi' plenty of bone.''* A ncAV pack 



* Almost the last words of old Tom Grant, many years huntsman to his Grace the 

 Duke of Richmond. 



