170 THE SOUTH DEVON HUNT 



typical as any. Meeting at Haldon Belvidere, the 

 pack first put a vixen to ground and then raced a 

 dog-fox for three-quarters of an hour, when he too 

 found shelter below. Finding again at Goosemoor, 

 they ran their third fox by the Belvidere to Kiddens, 

 left-handed to Whiteway and round to the Belvidere 

 again, and then on by the Brick Kilns to Doddis- 

 combsleigh and Scannacleave, killing an old dog-fox 

 in the open. 



The pack occasionally clashed with Mr. Tremlett's 

 Hounds, which hunted some country north of that 

 covered by Mr. Studd, and in this particular season 

 also got mixed up in Bridford Wood with Mr. 

 Norton's Hounds, and the two packs together hunted 

 a brace of foxes around that big woodland. 



Mr. Studd tried once the experiment that has been 

 tried by other masters, namely, afternoon cub- 

 hunting, and met at Oxton at 3 p.m. on the 7th 

 September, getting home at eight in the evening. 

 The experiment, however, was not repeated. 



Several causes contributed to make Mr. Studd's 

 last season, 1890-1, a bad one. In the first place, 

 throughout the cubhunting season and well into the 

 regular season, the weather was very dry and hot, 

 with a consequent absence of scent. It was, in fact, 

 a very bad scenting season throughout. After 

 Christmas, frost and snow interfered considerably 

 with the sport. Then on the 9th March came the 

 famous blizzard already referred to, following an 

 abnormal February during which month not a single 

 drop of rain fell in the country. The practice of 

 letting shootings, too, which had been on the increase 

 of recent years, took an even more extended form, 

 with the result that not only did the number of foxes 

 decrease in a marked degree, but many coverts were 



