A FEW HINTS 93 



given up as hopeless, and the huntsman's impreca- 

 tions, if not uttered above his breath, are deep and 

 hearty. For it is always the best foxes that lie 

 lightly, and very little will disturb a fox that has 

 been well hunted a few times. Equally fatal to 

 sport is the assembling of a crowd of foot people at 

 the edges of a covert in the day's draw. The 

 chattering, smoking, eager crowd give the fox 

 ample warning of what is going to happen, and by 

 the time the covert is drawn he has gone miles. 

 Several times have I seen what might have turned 

 out an excellent day's sport spoiled in the manner 

 indicated, and though I am not an advocate for 

 meeting at one place and drawing another country 

 altogether, I am bound to admit that Masters will 

 be obliged to adopt that plan if there is not an 

 improvement. I would point out that there is no 

 excuse for mounted sportsmen doing this very 

 unsportsmanlike thing, and a quarter of an hour's 

 earlier start, which would not entail any hardship 

 on any one, would entirely obviate any necessity 

 there might be for taking short cuts. 



Another thing in which men seem determined 



o 



to do their uttermost to spoil their own sport is by 

 pressing hounds unduly when they check. No 

 sooner do hounds throw up their heads and the 

 huntsman takes hold of them to cast them than the 

 eager field follow him in his cast instead of stand- 

 ing still as they ought to do. And remonstrance 

 in many cases does but little good ; men stand 

 still, it is true, till the huntsman gets a few yards 

 farther off them, and then they move on just the 

 same, and the moment a hound hits off the line, 

 or they think that a hound hits off the line, they 

 are on the top of the pack, and cause in many 



