THE OTTERHOUND. 



153 



than, probable that the rough-coated terrier 

 is identical with the now recognised Otter- 

 hound as an offshoot of the Southern Hound ; 

 but be that as it may, there has been a 

 special breed of Otterhound for the last 



the ri\-er, and fish down and back. He is 

 then more accessible, and it is under such 

 conditions that the best sport is obtained. 

 But still these animals are wrapt in won- 

 drous mystery. The Rev. C. Da\ies, who 



eighty years, verj' carefully bred and gradu- wrote in The New Sporting Magazi'.ie under 

 aUv much improved in point of appear- the nomme de guerre of " Gelert," in giving 

 ance. They are beautiful hounds to-day, his experience of South Devon otter-hunt- 

 with heads as tvpical as those of Blood- ing early in the 'forties, relates that he 

 hounds, legs and feet 

 that would do for Fox- 

 hounds, a unique coat 

 of their own, and they 

 are exactly suitable for 

 hunting the otter, as 

 everx^one knows who 

 has had the enjo\'ment 

 of a day's sport on 

 river cw brook. 



The ver}^ existence of 

 the otter is a mystery. 

 He seldom allows him- 

 self to be seen. There 

 is a cunning about the 

 animal that induces 

 him to li\-e far away 

 from the haunts of 

 man, and to occupy 

 two totally different 

 points of vantage, as 

 it were, in as many 

 hours. He ma\^ live in 

 a burrow on a cliff 

 b}- the sea, and his fishing exploits may 

 extend seven or eight miles up a river, 

 generally in the hours nearest midnight. 

 A stream in South Devon defied whole 

 generations of otter hunters, or perhaps, 

 more properly speaking, the otters did. No 

 matter how early in the morning the hunt 

 was started, there would be a hot trail up 

 stream, hounds throwing their tongues 

 and dashing from bank to bank, through 

 pools, over clitters of rocks, and often 

 landing on meadow-side ; but there would 

 be no otter, and then the hunt would turn 



THE SOUTHERN HOUND (1803). 



From " The Sportsman's CMnsi:' By P. Reinagte, R.A. 



quite astonished old resident farmers when 

 he first commenced hunting near their 

 homesteads. They asked him what he 

 was doing. He replied that he was " otter- 

 hunting," and they laughed, and told 

 him they had never heard of such an 

 animal ; and yet he must have killed over 

 fifty in the ne.xt five years within a mile of 

 them, and of course otters had always 

 been there. It was the reverend gentle- 

 man's surmise, therefore, that the otter in- 

 habits nearly every river in Great Britain, 

 but that there is no knowing his where- 



and hounds would revel on a burning scent abouts until he is regularly hunted . 



down stream, the quarry meanwhile sleep- There are different opinions on the sub- 



ing in his sea-girt holt perfectly safe from ject as to how the otter should be hunted, 



any interference. Then, again, the otter and the kind of hound best suited for 



may live on the moorside at the head of the sport. Mr. Davies leant towards the 



