238 COVERT-SIDE SKETCHES. 



his master, and noting how perseveringly he will track him step 

 by step ; but see the same dog — say a terrier — excited in the 

 chase of a rabbit, and the chances are he is over the scent, and 

 loses it in a very short time. Hence I infer that it is not so 

 much superiority of nose as want of patience, and method in 

 using it, that debars most dogs, more particularly hounds, from 

 hunting as cold a scent as the bloodhound. Let him work and 

 drive like the fox-hound, and he would no longer hunt a man or 

 deer hours after he had been gone. 



It is time, however, that I dismissed him, as he is more used 

 for companionship than sport in the ]3resent day ; but I may 

 say that those who keep them may have a great deal of enjoy- 

 ment by doing as Mr. Eoden did, and treating themselves and 

 their friends to a fine piece of hunting occasionally, when they 

 have a suitable locality at hand, and enhance the pleasure to be 

 derived from the possession of one of the grandest breeds of dogs 

 at the present time in existence. No doubt many do so ; but I 

 fear that, on the other hand, a large proportion of the bloodhounds 

 now alive are looked on merely as pets and show-dogs, and lead 

 about as useless lives as they possibly could do. 



