HUNTING DIRECTORY. 145 



Young Fox-hounds at Hare. 



ference to vermin, caeteris paribus, I will not dispute ; I 

 think it very possible he may ; but this I am certain of — 

 that every fox-hound will leave a bad scent of fox, for a 

 good one of either hare or deer, unless he has been made 

 steady from them ; and in this, I shall not fear to be con- 

 tradicted. But, as I do not wish to enter abstruse rea- 

 soning with you, or think it any ways material to our 

 present purpose, whether the dogs we call fox-hounds 

 w^ere originally designed by nature to hunt fox or not, 

 Ave will drop the subject. I must at the same time beg 

 leave to observe, that dogs are not the only animals in 

 which an extraordinary diversity of species has happen- 

 ed since the days of Adam. Yet a great naturalist tells 

 us, that man is nearer, by eight degrees, to Adam, than 

 is the dog to the first dog of his race ; since the age of 

 man is fourscore years, and that of a dog but ten. It 

 therefore follows, that if both should equally degenerate, 

 the alteration would be eight times more remarkable in 

 the dog than in the man. 



" The two most necessary questions which result from 

 the foregoing premises, are — whether hounds entered at 

 hare are perfectly steady, afterwards, to fox ; — and 

 whether steadiness is not attainable by more reasonable 

 means. Having never hunted with gentlemen who fol- 

 low this practise, I must leave the first question for others 

 to determine ; but having always had my hounds steady, 

 I can myself answer the second." 



