February Fill-dyke 



man, speaking of the whole duty of huntsmen, 

 insist upon that worthy being consistent in 

 showing sport. He is generally very lavish in 

 expressing his opinion as to what a huntsman 

 should or should not do, and especially has he 

 a great deal of fault to find when hounds have 

 had a bad day after a long frost. That he 

 knows nothing about the science of hunting is 

 obvious the moment he opens his mouth to tell 

 you that it is the huntsman's business to show 

 sport, by which he means a given amount of 

 galloping and jumping; and the more a hunts- 

 man tries to hunt his fox, the more he is 

 condemned by many of his impatient followers. 

 And too frequently those who ought to know 

 better — nay, perhaps, who do know better, but 

 who let their impatience get the better of their 

 discretion — are to be found amongst the ranks 

 of the critics. 



Let me give an instance, though it has 

 nothing to do with February fill-dyke. Hounds 

 had been running nicely for thirty-five minutes, 

 and they checked. There was a halloa to the 

 right, about half a mile off, and the huntsman 



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