94 WITH HOUND AND TERRIER. 



I heard a hound's voice and a great commotion 

 going on below. E-unning down, I found my uncle 

 in the hall, and the butler in a great state of per- 

 turbation holding on to the dining-room door. It 

 seemed that my uncle had gone into the room and 

 discovered poor Russian lying under the table, and 

 the man on being called had stupidly armed him- 

 self with a whip to try and drive him out. At 

 this insult the old dog had promptly shown fight, 

 and with hackles up and gleaming eyes bade de- 

 fiance to his enemies, so that when I arrived on the 

 scene he was in undisputed possession of the room. 

 His absence, however, had by this time been dis- 

 covered, and one of the whippers - in appearing, 

 Russian was ignominiously coupled up and led off. 



After Press's retirement he always used to walk 

 out to see his old favourites when they were near 

 his home, and once on Poyntingdon Down he saw 

 the hunted fox dead-beat crawl into a gorse. 

 Instantly he gave one of his peculiar holloas, and 

 two or three of his old hounds, recognising his 

 voice, raced up to him and killed their fox. 



Up to a short time before he gave up. Press had 

 what one who hunted with him constantly main- 

 tains was " a genius about foxes." He certainly 

 had a marvellous way of picking up a cold line, and 

 when hounds could make nothing of it. Press would 

 catch them up, gallop off straight as an arrow to 

 some point a mile distant, perhaps, and recover his 

 hunted fox and kill him. On such occasions half 

 the field probably had no idea that he had not been 



