NOTITIA VENATICA. 40 



CHAP. II. 



THE KENNEL. 



" It proceeded from the nature of the vapourish place." — Sandys. 



CONTENTS. 



Situation for a kennel~Mr. White's opinion of trees— Plan for erectiiig a kennel — 

 Wm. Smith's opinion on letting hounds lie out in the courts — The young hounds' 

 kennel— The grass court — Shutting up hounds by themselves — A perfect kennel 

 described —The boiling-house and feeding-room — Rats in kennels — Great num- 

 bers destroyed in some kennels — a doe kept in Mr. Warde's kennel — Damp and 

 dry kennels — Kennel lameness — Col. Cooke's opinion— Hounds lamed by gorse 

 — The subject of kennel lameness continued — The Albrighton hounds — Mr. 

 Foljambe's opinion — The late Lord Kintore's hounds, and the situation of their 

 kennel — Bees kept in the Duke of Nassau's kennel — Dick Knight, the builder of 

 the kennels at Brigstock — The Warwickshire kennels — The Holderness kennels 

 at Bishop Burton — Lameness in the royal kennels on Ascot Heath — Lead sup- 

 posed to be the cause — Dr. Ryan's opinion — Mr. Davis, the huntsman's, opi- 

 nion, and letter to the author — Lameness in the Warwickshire woodland kennels 

 — On the practice of washing hounds — Jack Wood's opinion — Cast-iron and 

 wooden benches — Whitewashing kennels, and drying them — Expense of building 

 new kennels — The Pytehley kennels at Brixworth. 



It is no less curious than true, that although there is one point on 

 which all authors are agreed in erecting a kennel, namely, that it is to 

 he on a healthy spot, yet a true description of what is really a proper 

 situation has never been given. One recommends it to he built on high 

 ground, while another declares that it is impossible to have the place 

 kept sweet and clean without a stream of water running through it : it 

 has also been advised to have it shaded by trees, as if the all-cheering 

 rays of the sun were not the chief means of drying the courts, and dis- 

 sipating those noxious vapours which invariably attend the keeping to- 

 gether so large a body of animals as a pack of hoimds. Mr. White, in 

 his " Natural History of Sclbourne," in speaking of the effect that 

 trees have near any place, says, " that they are great promoters of 

 damp, and that they perspire profusely, condense largely, and check 

 evaporation so much, that woods are always moist ; no wonder, there- 

 fore, that they contribute much to pools and streams." 



I will now proceed to point out what, in mj humble opinion, are the 

 chief essentials to be attended to in erecting a kennel for fifty couples of 

 hounds, omitting nothing which can in any way throw a light upon a sub- 

 ject which I fear is, nine times in ten, left to the creative genius of those 



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