THE OTTER AND HIS WAYS, 297 



I do not think otters are decreasing in numbers, neither do I 

 consider them more plentiful than they were forty years ago. In 

 those days we reckoned 10 otters a good season ; but the reason 

 we average more now is due to the railway, a help we did not get 

 in former years, the hounds having been often compelled to do 

 long, weary road-work before they reached the river side. For 

 instance, I have left Hillmoor at 2 o'clock in the morning, jogged 

 on to Exe Bridge, 16 miles, left my pony there, drawn up the Barle 

 and killed my otter on the way. Then a crust of bread and Cheese 

 at Withypool and at it again, over Winsford Hill to the Exe ; 

 found and killed another otter, picked up my pony at Exe Bridge, 

 and back again with tired hounds the same night to Hillmoor ; 

 thus covering in the day at least sixty miles. Hard work, you will 

 say, but sweetened by sport. 



1 can remember on one such occasion, when Mr. Tom Carew 

 was Master of the Tiverton Hounds and old John Beale the hunts- 

 man, that I met their party near Tarr-Steps on the Barle ; they 

 had killed a brace of foxes, I a brace of otters, and as we ap- 

 proached on either side of the river we saluted each other with a 

 couple of joyous who-whoops, blew our horns, and turned home- 

 wards. Of course my hounds could not do another day's work for 

 a week or more. But now, with the advantage of the railway, I 

 can hunt three or four days a week, so am able to make a larger 

 score. 



The time for otter hunting extends over a period of five 

 months only ; that is, from the middle of April to the middle 

 of September ; but as frost stops foxhounds, so do floods stop 

 otter hounds, and it is no uncommon event in a wet season to 

 find rivers quite unhuntable for weeks together ; so the short 

 measure of time allotted to the sport is thus seriously curtailed. 

 Nevertheless such hindrances in no wise affect the working 

 powers of the otter hound, for it matters little how lusty he may 

 become provided care is taken to keep his feet right by regular 

 exercise. And this at all times is an important point, for 

 unless the balls of the feet are protected by the horny substance 

 which only road exercise will give, the water soon soddens and 

 renders them painfully tender ; and then, if the hound is not 

 crippled, he becomes at least slack in his work, and does not 



