10 HARE-HUNTING. 



country for which they are intended. Hares now are 

 never trailed to their forms. In drawing for them in 

 the open, the huntsman will do well to remember that 

 on their seats they have little or no scent, and that 

 when started in cover they will frequently hunt the 

 hounds for the purpose of making foil. If the scent be 

 true, the cry will grow more faint ; if it be forward, it 

 will increase ; this is the best guide when hounds are 

 hunting out of sight, though it is, by no means, at all 

 times to be relied upon. If you hear your hounds 

 break cover, without being able to discover for what 

 point they are making, it will assist you to know that a 

 hare almost invariably faces the wind. 



Once on foot, you will find her make use of many 

 artifices, such as running to a head, heading back, 

 thereby foiling the ground ; then throwing two or three 

 times, and making head again, which puts the dogs to 

 a check, causing them to overshoot, and gives her an 

 opportunity of throwing in again, and returning on the 

 foil. In this case, make your casts counter till you 

 come to her home, where you will find her. Some- 

 times, when she is very hard run, she will take vault : 

 sometimes, after several throws, she will lie down, take 

 to the water, &c., and let the hounds overshoot. The 

 more that good-seasoned hounds are left to themselves, 

 the better they will hunt, the more sport they will 

 afford, and the more surely kill : in general, they are 

 too much hallooed. A hare should be patiently followed 

 through all her doubles, for in this consists the fair 



