THE HUNTED FOX 107 



ance to beat hounds, and for two seasons he suc- 

 ceeded. 



It was one morning late in the cub-hunting season 

 of 1883 that hounds were put into the covert. They 

 spoke at once, and almost without a moment's pause 

 they settled on the line. There was one of those 

 rare scents on which hounds never pause or waver, 

 but turn with every bend of the fox's course. It 

 was impossible to stop them. When they reached 

 the big wood with but two men in attendance, the 

 first whipper-in and another, the hounds were so 

 close to the fox that he was driven right through the 

 covert without a chance to turn, and was killed two 

 fields away on the far side. 



It is quite possible that one cause of the degene- 

 racy of foxes is that we are always hunting and killing 

 the simple-minded animals and allowing the more 

 cunning ones to escape. For when we speak and 

 write of the degeneracy of foxes we refer of course to 

 the amount of sport we have with them. From the 

 fox's point of view the more intelligent and cunning 

 the animal is the more likely he is to survive. The 

 saying that, with a mature fox that has a fair start, the 

 odds are six to four on the fox as against the best 

 pack of hounds, may be brought up against me here 

 But this applies to that large majority of hunting 



