70 NOTITIA VENATICA. 



can hunt a pack of hounds properly without feeding them ; and, more- 

 over, that no man can feed a pack to run together without hunting them, 

 so that he may ho thoroughly acquainted with their constitutions, and 

 the eifect that high or low feeding may have upon their pace and stout- 

 ness. I have frequently fancied that hounds which had been travelled 

 the day previous to hunting, for the purpose of lying out at some more 

 contiguous spot to the place of meeting, have not shown themselves in 

 such good ioind, when at work, as they generally had been accustomed 

 to he when they had only left their kennels on the hixnting morning, 

 and this I can attribute to two causes ; first of all, many huntsmen who 

 fancy their hounds are in for an extraordinary hard day's work give 

 them thicker feed than usual, and more of it ; and, in the next place, I 

 do not think hounds digest so easily while travelling along as they do 

 when lying quietly on their benches ; and this supposition is still more 

 confirmed by the full appearance of their flanks upon the occasions above 

 alluded to. Some huntsmen are in the habit of feeding with a lump of 

 parboiled flesh such hounds as are too fast for the rest of the pack on 

 the mornings of hunting, as they will throw ofi^ any other description of 

 feed. But it is, after all, a bad system. How can a hound work to any 

 effect with his belly half fuU ? It is much better to get rid of such 

 hounds at once. No doubt there is a great deal of truth in what 

 has been said about men feeding their own hounds, as I know, by 

 my own experience, that if a huntsman knows anytliing of feed- 

 ing, he can generally perform that duty to better cflPect than a man 

 who stays at home, and is consequently in ignorance of the way in which 

 the work is performed in the field ; besides, nothing makes hounds 

 fonder of their huntsman, or handier in casting or lifting them, than the 

 constantly being with them, ministering to their wants, and caressing 

 them, and by never, on any account, striking or scolding them. No 

 gentleman, who is his own huntsman, should over think of entering his 

 kennel Avithout first putting on a large frock, made of jean or brown 

 hoUand, to protect his clothes, that he may allow his pack to come round 

 him without the fear of their being ill-naturccUy beaten or repulsed. 

 Dogs are animals not to be trifled with ; and a bloAV given to a faultless 

 hound, for no other crime than soiUng the coat of a dandy, may create a 

 shyness and antipathy in the animal which can never again be eradi- 

 cated. There are many first-rate amateur performers as huntsmen, 

 who do not attend to the feechng department themselves : and, to the 

 eye of an indifiPerent observer, their hounds may perform their Avork 

 without the slightest cause for reproach ; yet I have no doubt, if these 

 gentlemen would undertake the fatigue and trouble of doing it them- 

 selves, their performances in the chase would be much more to their sa- 

 tisfaction, and many a hound which is put away as not being able to go 

 the pace, or for tiring, woidd be by such means redeemed. The late 

 Duke of Cleveland, even to the last season of his keeping hounds, was 

 so devoted to them as to stay after hunting during the whole operation 

 of feeding, oven Avhen his clothes were soaked with rain. And to bad 

 health and rheumatism arising from this practice might be attributed 

 Ills abandonment of tlic chase. Mr. Osbaldoston, although an inde- 



