154 



THE NEW BOOK OF THE DOG. 



modern Foxhound, and he had many dis- 

 ciples holding the same views. They be- 

 lieved in the dash of the Foxhound to 

 keep the otter moving as soon as he was 

 dislodged from his holt, and it is certainly 

 very grand to see a pack of Foxhounds 

 swimming at really a great pace up stream 

 and to hear their voices fairly echo amid 

 the petty roar of waterfall or the bubbling 

 of rapid stream. It is sport that can never 

 be forgotten. Such was shown by Mr. 



MR. J. C. CARRICK'S SWIMMER 



BY LUCIFER COUNTESS. 



From a Painting by George Earl. 



Davies, and later by Mr. Trelawny's hounds, 

 the latter being the Master of the Dartmoor 

 country at the time ; and in the summer 

 he hunted otter with fourteen or fifteen 

 couples of his Foxhounds, and about one 

 couple of rough Otterhounds (Cardigan 

 being a notable one), and of course two or 

 three terriers. The old squire would never 

 admit, however, that the regular Otter- 

 hound was as good as the Foxhound, which 

 he would argue was better in every part 

 of a hunt than Cardigan. Others differ 

 partially from this view, and consider that 

 Foxhounds will miss a good many otters 

 in their over-anxiety to get forward. 



The Otterhound proper is very steady 

 and methodical ; he feels for a trail on 

 boulder or rock, and if he touches it he 



will throw his tongue just once or twice. 

 The scent may be one or two days old ; but 

 if fresher he repeats his own challenge, 

 becomes full of intent, moves a little up 

 stream, crosses the river, back again per- 

 haps, tells by his manner that the quarry 

 is about ; and if the hound is a good one, 

 and he is not hurried, he is sure to find, 

 although it may be three or four miles from 

 the starting point. Foxhounds might miss 

 all this. The Otterhound, again, is the far 

 better marker. The otter may be in some 

 drain a couple of hundred yards away from 

 the river, and his outlet may be at the 

 root of some old trees washed by the con- 

 stant flow into a deep refuge under water 

 to the depth of possibly four or five feet. 

 Foxhounds may flash over such a holt, 

 but the experienced Otterhound is always 

 on the look-out for such places. He steadies 

 himself as he swims that way, turns his 

 head to the bank, is not quite sure, so lifts 

 himself to the trunk of the tree bending 

 down to the water. The otter has landed 

 there in the night, and a voice like thunder 

 says so. It is a find. The pack will be 

 all there now, and the notes of delight, 

 becoming savage, concern the otter so far 

 that he will generally shift his quarters 

 at this stage without the aid of the terrier. 

 The tell-tale chain of bubbles is then sqen, 

 or the animal coming up to vent, and then 

 the hunt is in all its fullest excitement. He 

 may beat them, by slipping down stream, 

 or into very deep water ; but, with good 

 hounds and the right sort of men as the 

 hunters, the odds are against the otter. 



There was one point upon which Squire 

 Trelawny was very particular, and that was 

 that the otter was not to be touched in any 

 way, but left entirely to the hounds. If 

 it came to his ears that one had been hit 

 by a pole, nothing could well exceed his 

 anger ; and this was in contrast to the old- 

 fashioned ways of Scotland, of which there 

 are pictures of the otter being held up on a 

 barbed spear. 



The Dartmoor was always a very fair 

 hunt, and it is so now, although for many 

 years since detached from the fox-hunting 

 establishment. It was in the hands at 



