122 THE JOYS OF CUB-HUNTING. 



continually jumping up before them in cover and 

 crossing them, or not ; but when they have been 

 blooded by two or three brace of foxes, and perceive 

 that they are not assisted by the old ones when pur- 

 suing hares and other riot, they will soon learn to leave 

 them, and join that part of the pack that are settled 

 to a fox; to gain this end, Wood considered that 

 downright hard work and perseverance, were the only 

 means, and no man ever acted up to his own maxim in a 

 more determined manner ; I have seen him frequently 

 in some of the largest and thickest covers in Warwick- 

 shire, with hounds torn and cut all to pieces, abso- 

 lutely walk up to a beaten fox, which had been crawl- 

 ing before him with a miserable scent for hours, and 

 kill him at last ; I have seen him repeatedly do this 

 when another huntsman would have been dead beat 

 by the heat of the morning, or the distance from his 

 kennel, and have contented himself with riding home 

 and murdering a fresh fox in a gorse cover on the 

 next hunting day, by way of keeping his pack in 

 blood. Long tiring mornings in the early part of the 

 season, when the weather is hot, are by no means to 

 be recommended, but one stout fox hunted fairly up 

 to with a moderate scent, in a large thick woodland, 

 will do more good than killing six brace in gorse 

 covers or small hollow spinies.* Owing to the large 

 ungovernable fields of horsemen which, in these, days 



* Nothing tends more to render young hounds, or even old ones, skirters and 

 shifty in their work, as it is termed, than continually cub-hunting them in gorse 

 or whin covers, by their being enabled when distressed to come to the outside, 

 and meet the fox in the rides and rackways. This, however, is unavoidable in 

 some open countries, where this description of covers abounds without any 

 woodlands. 



