The Hunting Year 



in front of hounds, " I always let them alone, 

 I like them to do it themselves." 



For an hour or so the game goes on merrily. 

 Hounds change once, twice — half a dozen times. 

 The old foxes have left the covert long ago; 

 so have the best and boldest of the cubs. The 

 others, all but some four or five, have found 

 shelter in rabbit spouts. The ground by this 

 time has got thoroughly foiled and hounds can 

 no longer carry a head. Indeed, they can 

 scarcely own a line. 



Now is the critical moment. Carefully the 

 huntsman gets his hounds together, making as 

 little noise as possible, and patiently he draws 

 them through the thickest of the covert ; a hound 

 speaks — then another — then they hunt slowly 

 for a few minutes and check again. 



The morning by this time is hot, and it is 

 close and stuffy in the wood ; the unaccustomed 

 early rising is beginning to tell its tale, and the 

 attention is beginning to relax ever such a little. 

 A little object crawling through the undergrowth 

 is scarcely noticed at first — it is a rabbit perhaps 

 — it cannot be a fox — hounds are at the other 



3* 



