NOTITIA VENATICA. 115 



elude that tlicy Avoukl stick to that thing which was most coiicUicivc to 

 their sport, which was in those days pretty much what good cub-huuting 

 is at the present time during the whole of their season. At a later 

 period the afternoon system was tried again, and again abandoned, for 

 the best of reasons — viz., that it was found not to answer. In the 

 first place, the day is every moment becoming darker, after you have 

 thrown off, that is if you hunt late enough to derive any benefit from 

 the falhng dew ; and in some countries a fox has to be looked for an 

 hour and a half before he can be found, therefore I tliink I need not 

 comment any farther upon that point. In the second place, there is no 

 drag, and the foxes being empty, have too great an advantage over the 

 young hounds. In the next place, the hounds have to be travelled to 

 the place of meeting in the heat, instead of a nice cool dewy morning, 

 a material point in my humble opinion ; again, the hounds and horses 

 have to be attended to in the dark upon their return from hunting, and 

 thus the drawbacks, without the advantages of a i^erpetual winter, are 

 introduced into the hunting calendar. Moreover, going out hunting, 

 even after a moderate dinner, is not very agreeable, and most huntsmen 

 and whippers-iu have too much of the animal about them to put on the 

 setting-muzzle at one o'clock : consequently their powers of exertion 

 are considerably diminished, while '' the foxes hecomo stouter in their 

 natures towards night," as Mr. Smith observes in his " Diary of a Hunts- 

 man." I could go on enumerating a dozen more objections to the 

 system of evening cuh-hunting, but I should consider those already ad- 

 duced quite sufiicient for any purpose. If hounds were taken out cub- 

 hunting in the afternoon regularly, it would be a great inducement to 

 people to join them who would never have the least idea of such a 

 thing if they were to be smiimonedfrom their beds at four or five o'clock 

 in the morning. Such a concourse of sportsmen at such a season is 

 the very reverse of desirable ; for if hounds set to running but ever so 

 short a distance " the field" must set to ride, and press upon the hounds. 

 What is usually denominated sport during the regidar season ought 

 never to be looked for in cub-hunting ; and as long as the young hounds 

 are taught to hunt the line, and are kept at work chiefly in cover, where 

 they can be more effectually di-illed uutil they become steady, and are 

 well blooded, the grand object is obtained. The whole system of cub- 

 hunting is so much changed during the last fifteen years that it is now 

 quite a difierent kind of amusement ; in the first place, hounds do not 

 begin so early in the summer as formerly, partly on account of their 

 cub-huntiug ground being diminished by the numerous preserves of 

 pheasants in many hunts, where the proprietors wiU on no account allow 

 a hound to enter until the regular hunting season. A curious, and, at 

 the same time, erroneous, supposition is cherished in some parts of 

 England, even in these enlightened times, and amongst others at Rise, 

 in Yorkshire, the property of Mr. Bethell, where the custom of celebra- 

 ting the fifth of November is stiU kept up by all the idle vagabonds in 

 the neighbom-ing villages, and who maintain their right to fire off their 

 guns not only after sunset but during the whole of the day. There being 

 a large preserve of pheasants in Rise Wood, it has been considered next 



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