98 NOTITIA VENATICA. 



selected is to round tliem, as by the time the soreness of their cars has 

 recovered, and the natural timidity and wildness arising from the novelty 

 of their new mode of living has gradually worn off, they will become 

 sufficiently tractable to walk out in couples, and to proceed in some sort 

 of order from their court-yard to the feeding-room. Some of the for- 

 ward puppies win come in as early as Christmas ; these should be 

 Avalked out in couples daily, and taught their names from the very first 

 period of their entering the kennel. But the education of a young hound 

 may be said to commence from that time when, after being recovered 

 from the effects of rounding, the new entry are first taken out in regu- 

 lar order to foot exercise in couples. Some huntsmen defer rounding 

 their puppies until they have had them in couples more than two months, 

 and half broke them. This plan may be right ; but there are two ob- 

 jections to it, in my humble opinion, if not more. In the first place, 

 the later the operation of rounding is performed the more hot the 

 weather becomes, and the more troublesome the flies ; in the next place, 

 when their ears are chopped off when they first come into the kennel 

 there is no interruption to their education. Care should be taken not 

 to draft too close, as the ravages caused by the distemper have very 

 frequently so thinned the number "put forward" that there has not 

 been a sufficiency left without having recourse to the second draft of an- 

 other pack. It is a most excellent custom in many kennels, where the num- 

 ber of puppies will allow of it, to put forward twenty -two or twenty-three 

 couples, and to make a second draft as soon as the young hounds have 

 recovered and may be considered safely landed from the effects of the 

 distemper. Three hours on the flags may be very agreeably spent at 

 tills season of the year by a real sportsman, but it is a sad hove to one 

 ivho is not an admirer of the symtnetrical. The usual routine com- 

 mences by drawing the hounds of the year in litters, and showing them 

 with the dam, and also the sire, if he be at that time in the kennel, and 

 so on from the two, three, and four-season hunters to the end of the 

 chapter. Now, if the said visitor is what is termed a houndsman, he 

 is twigged in one moment by the huntsman, and the raree-show goes on 

 with all the alacrity and scientific display which the showman is capable 

 of exercising. Huntsmen like to talk with sportsmen about their 

 hounds ; and the more questions asked, and remarks made, by one of 

 the craft, the better they are pleased. Judicious observations, added to 

 a well-merited praise, wiU, in many instances, go much further with 

 such men as Tom Carter, Joe Maiden, or Tom Sebright, than a guinea 

 presented by an ignoramus. What fun I have seen, to be sure, with 

 some men during an inspection of hounds ! Poor fellows ! they wished 

 themselves Avell out again, after having been introduced to about three 

 or four couples ; and, generally sj)caking, this description of inspector 

 ?.s not treated with an individual sight of each hound, but the whole 

 l^ack (especially if it be near walking out time) are taken out " en 

 masse," and shown altogether in the ])addock. I don't wonder at 

 huntsmen getting tired of exhibiting their hounds to some men ; for the 

 ignorance displayed, and the silly and trivial questions asked, ai-c 

 enough to weary the patience of Job himself. The following ease, that 



