NOTITIA VENATICA. 155 



tlic cover-side. In a black frost the scent is frequently good ; Init in a, 

 white one, Avlien it is going oil", there is seldom any. Frosty mornings, 

 with stormy Aveathcr after mid-day, arc seldom favourable to sport ; and 

 if a large black cloud comes suddenly over, the scent generally fails 

 during its influence. One poet tells us that " a southerly wind and a 

 cloudy sky" are necessary for a good day's sport ; Avhile another de- 

 scribes one of the best days ever seen in Leicestershire as taking place 

 " with the wind at north-east forbiddingly keen." Some persons fancy 

 that the Avetter a country is the better the scent Avill be ; this is, to a 

 certain extent, erroneous, as, although moisture in some shape is con- 

 ducive to it, so, on the other hand, too much wet chills the soil and also 

 the atmosphere, and destroys it. When I hunted Holderness, which is 

 allowed to be one of the deepest and Avettest countiies in England, I 

 observed that there Avas ahvays the best scent when the ground merely 

 shoAved the impression of the ball of the fox's foot ; Avhen it Avas soft 

 enough to alloAv the leg to penetrate deep into the soil, Avhen it Avas 

 " deluded Avith Avater," as old Will Carter used to observe,* the residt 

 generally was that there Avas little or no scent. Again, in sandy coun- 

 tries I have frequently observed a burning scent in the spring, Avhen the 

 exhalations Avere the strongest on hot sunny days. One cause to which 

 the scent failing from the beginning of a run is from the misfortune of 

 running the heehvay of the fox's line, Avhich.I have often seen done, 

 even up to his very kennel. Such a circumstance as this is more likely 

 to occur in woodlands than otherAvise, excepting in the case of hounds 

 coming across the line of a disturbed fox. I met Avith the folloAving 

 in an old manuscript I Avas reading the other day : — 



" Feb. 25th, 1788. — The Pytchley hounds met at Orlingbury Old. In the course 

 of the morning, as the hounds were going to draw near Ecton, they struck a scent 

 through a hedge, and ran very hard into Billingfield, where they came to a check ; 

 Avhen, after some time lost in making a cast, Dick Knight found a kennel in a patch 

 of young furze, and inquired of a shepherd if he had seen the fox, when he said his 

 dog had put him up a short time before, and we found we had been running heel. 

 We then went back, and laid the hounds on the right way ; but it was too late, as 

 the scent had died away, therefore Ave gave it up."t 



Another reason for hounds not being able to Avork over some dis- 

 tricts, independent of sheep, cattle, &c., is the amazing number of hares 

 Avhich on some estates are preserved to such an extent as to entirely foil 

 the ground. I could enumerate many instances as happening to myself, 

 corroborative of what I have been saying ; but the tAvo folloAving ac- 

 counts of the sport of hounds being thus spoilt Avill, I should conceive, 

 1)0 a much stronger proof as occurring to tAVO such great authorities as 



* Some years ago when Lord Middleton hunted the country known as Sir Tatton 

 Sykes's country, old Will Carter being at this time his lordship's huntsman, the 

 hounds were brought to cover one morning at the usual hour, when Will, to relieve 

 the gentlemen already arrived from the anxiety of waiting, with a low bow thus ad- 

 dressed them : — " My lord's compliments, and he does not intend hunting this morn- 

 ing, as the country is so ' deluded' with water." 



t E.xtract from memoranda in MSS., entitled " Pytchley Chase-book." 



