RIDING OVER THE SHIRES 193 



even when they are hunting slowly than they do 

 over plough, that we are much sooner left behind 

 than we should be where hounds meet alike with a 

 colder scent and more hindrances. 



In a grass country the scent keeps on improving 

 as hounds drive forward, so that the chances are 

 that a pack once settled to the line of their fox will 

 keep on running faster and faster. Scent, it is true, 

 often dies out very quickly in grass countries, but 

 while hounds can run on it at all, they can always 

 run forward with more confidence than they do over 

 a plough country. When they cease to drive, they 

 very often cease to run. It follows from this that 

 hounds soon run away from the laggards. 



Then there is another point. The grass fields are 

 very large, some of the pastures round Foxton, Carlton 

 Curlieu, Noseley, RoUeston and Skeffington being of 

 immense extent. They are perhaps sixty or a hun- 

 dred acres, or even more. Such great fields offer no 

 obstacle to a pack of hounds, and, as we all know 

 that hounds are faster than horses, the pack will soon 

 leave us hopelessly out of the hunt if we do not keep 

 near them. If there is a scent, indeed, we may fail 

 even with our very best efforts to remain on terms 

 with the hounds. Let me give an instance. In the 

 season of 1901-2, the Cottesmore hounds found a 

 fox in Skeffington. There was no great scent in the 

 woods, a single hound throwing his tongue at inter- 

 vals all down the covert. The huntsman, of course, 

 kept moving on, and near him were three men 

 whose names, were I to write them down here, would 

 be those of men who are heard of in most good runs, 

 though none of them are very young. When the 

 hounds reached Priesthill Coppice, they burst into 

 a loud chorus and raced away. There were but 



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