NOTITIA VENATK'A. 69 



or ground oats may be substituted for a short time ; and, with legard 

 to those bitches which may be at large suckling whelps, neither they 

 nor their young otFspring should be served with the feed in which 

 nettles or other vegetables have been mixed, as the worst consequences 

 will, in all probabihty, be the result, but a small copper should be kept for 

 their exclusive use during the breeding season, Avhere vegetables are used. 

 It is quite impossible to feed in good workmanlike style, or make the 

 most of the meat, unless the ingredients are good of their kind, well 

 prepared and properly mixed. No department in the management of the 

 kennel was considered of greater importance than the boiling and pre- 

 paring the food by that fine old sportsman, Mr. J. Warde, whose expe- 

 rience, both in feeding and breeding hounds, and Avhoae opinion in all 

 matters relating to the chase, stood amongst the fox-hunters of the old 

 school — even if he did get too slow for modern times — in as high esti- 

 mation as the oracle at Delphi did amongst the Athenians, So con- 

 vinced was he of the necessity of having the meal well-boiled, that 

 almost the first question he asked a new whipper-in or kennel-man, who 

 might offer himself as a candidate for his service, was Avhether he knew 

 how to " thick a copper ;" and, according to the knowledge evinced in 

 the culinary art of the boiling-house, his estimation of the person rose 

 or fell. The following is the proper way to make a pudding, or " thick- 

 up," as it is sometimes expressed in kennel language. First, take care 

 that your water is thoroughly boiling ; then keep strewing in the oat- 

 meal with one hand, holding the vessel containing the meal in the other 

 arm, stopping ever and anon to stir it up well with a wooden stirrer, 

 having also a strong stick, resembling a fork handle, with an iron scraper 

 at one end, to move it jjerpetually from the bottom, to prevent its burn- 

 ing. The better the oatmeal, the less it Avill take ; but you Avill know 

 Avhen you have used sufficient by its becoming thick and sweUing to its 

 proper consistency. Let it boil for two hours, and then put out the fire, 

 and ladle it out into the cooler, where, if it is properly made, and the 

 meal old and good, in the course of a few hours it will bear the weight 

 of a man to jump on it. The old plan of mixing the feed used to be to 

 boil up the meal with the broth and flesh all together ; but there are 

 many objections to it. In the first place, the meal does not go so far, 

 nor does it stay by the hounds so long as when the meal is made into a 

 pudding by itself ; and in the next place, what may be left will ferment 

 and become totally unfit for use in a few hours. It may here be re- 

 marked that the best made pudding will occasionally ferment from the 

 following causes — thunder ; change in the weather ; if any broth has 

 by chance got into the copper or buckets which have been used in mov- 

 ing it, and if the cooler has not been well washed out with a brush since 

 it may have been last emptied. Fermented food will invariably cause a 

 looseness in hounds, consequently it should be avoided. The feeding- 

 hounds, to make the most of their poAvers and constitutions, is another 

 art, which, amongst the ordinary run of fox-hunters, is not much consi- 

 dered, whereas half the secret in making a pack nin together consists in 

 a thorough knowledge of that branch of the science. I have heard many 

 men, who wero good judges too in these matters, declare that no man 



