94 SPORTS AND ANECDOTES. 



them on how did he manage to run at all how did 

 he find his living during such a time as he must have 

 spent, and how was it that he was not consumed 

 away by pain and sorrow ? He however did not 

 seem to ail anything but that he was unable to run. 

 All these queries, good reader, are for you to 

 decide, I can only say what I saw. 



Some years after the story of the fox with the 

 snares on his pads, another somewhat curious accident 

 happened to a vixen, who did her very best to save 

 her brush. We had run our fox for a long while, and 

 were, as we thought, about to kill her. We ran her 

 into Turnpole W 7 ood, where, in the days I am speak- 

 ing of, there were sundry holes or openings, which 

 were called swallow-holes, and which were as much 

 as seven, or from that to ten feet deep, and as large 

 as a small room, quite as large as a loose-box for a 

 horse. Into one of these, being sorely pressed, she 

 went head foremost, and five or six hounds after her. 

 It was growing quite dusk what was to be done ? 

 Our fox was down, and so were five or six hounds ! 

 The place was too deep to get down into without some 

 other aid than hands, and perhaps a spare stirrup 

 leathers, of which the huntsman and whips always 

 carried one. The edict therefore went out, "Jack," 



