130 NOTITIA VENATICA. 



perhaps not generally known, but nevertheless not the less curious, that 

 badgers go twelve months with young ; this fact I learned from a neigh- 

 bour of mine in Warwickshire, who some years ago dug out in the spring 

 a sow badger and pigs. The young ones Avcre destroyed, but the old 

 badger was confined in an out-house for twelve months, where I fre- 

 quently saw her, about which period she produced one young one. Dur- 

 ing her confinement it was impossible for her to have been visited by a 

 male, which is a conclusive proof of what I have stated about the period 

 of their gestation. 



It is generally given as the opinion of most sportsmexi that foxes are 

 not so stout as they Avere fifteen or twenty years ago, and that there are 

 not anything like the long runs there had used to be in those days. 

 There is without doubt a good deal of reason in this, for, in the first 

 place, the country is much more enclosed than in former times, nor are 

 there near such good scents as there had used to be, when the land was 

 in a more primitive state of cxiltivation ; sheep in those days were gene- 

 rally folded or kept in large flocks, and not, as they now are, divided 

 into small lots of eight or ten, and placed in nearly every field you pass 

 through in a run, where they never fail to follow the fox, and 

 stand jambed-up in the hedge just in the way of the hounds. Moreover 

 there are such numbers of bad French foxes turned down every season, 

 which being weak and obliged to be fed for a considerable length of 

 time cannot possibly have the least kuoAvledge of the country exceeding 

 about two miles from the place where they have been brought up, nor 

 strength to stand before hounds Avith anything like a scent if they did. 

 Roads and railroads are on the increase, and the whole face of the coun- 

 try being now built upon, a fox can seldom go any great distance with- 

 out being headed from his point. Game presen'ers and traps of all de- 

 scriptions lend their aid to defeat the object of the fox-hunter. The 

 modern system of hard riding, where all are in such a hurry, men, 

 horses, and hounds, that the fox gets almost immediately blown, when 

 he either turns short back or lies down in some convenient ditch, where 

 he carefully retraces his steps as soon as the whole cavalcade liave un- 

 Avittingly passed him. Such poor devils as these cannot be expected to 

 show long runs over a straight line of country ; but a good old dog fox, 

 such an one as used to be found at Hampton Coppice or Tyle Hill, in 

 my earlier days, going straight across the enclosures, Avithout deigning 

 to sneak under a hedge-row, Avould take more killing than half the fly- 

 ing packs of the present day could find time to bestow u])on him ; and 

 unless there was a real " ravishing scent," he might truly exclaim with 

 Coriolanus — 



" On fair ground I could cat forty of them." 



During the first part of the'cub-hunting season, as long as there is a 

 chance of find and killing foxes in large woodlands, hounds should never 

 on any account be taken to draw small spineys, or be suffered to work 

 in the open ; it is impossible to keep so large a body together as arc 

 generally taken out at that time of the year, and the mischief they may 

 be led to commit and the vices they may contract will be much easier ac- 



