136 STAG-HUNTING RECOLLECTIONS 



criticism of a man who was riding the horse that had taken 

 the milk to the station, when most of us were stih folded in 

 the arms of Morpheus. This, perhaps, is not very remark- 

 able, as the probability is the dairy farmer walks a puppy 

 and rides to hunt, whereas the other hunts to ride, and . 

 has a garden and a gardener which dispense very readily 

 with the companionship of a foxhound puppy.' No doubt 

 this is all absolutely true ; but, like most matters of fact, 

 it must be made the best of. The hound — as I shall have 

 occasion to say later on — is paramount in France ; the 

 horse here. 



But the over-riding, or rather the being ridden over con- 

 tingency, is one which largely determines the selection, the 

 career, and the future of a Queen's buckhound. Every now 

 and then Goodall notes in his diary how poor old this or 

 dear old that have got a little too close to some cut-me-down 

 captain, whose name he always contrives to get hold of. 

 Military rank is invariably given to the equestrian in these 

 semi-obituary notices. Possibly the neighbourhood of 

 Aldershot and Windsor, and the fact that unmanageable 

 horses seem to be an inseparable element in the society 

 of large garrison towns, account for this. But the question 

 of over-riding brings me to one or two of the more particular 

 reasons which justify my original and — setting aside harriers, 

 otterhounds, and beaglen - self-evident proposition, that a 

 foxhound is now the only possible staghound. Nose is hardly 

 the first consideration with a stag-hunter. The scent of a 

 deer lies so high and sweet, that most days there is enough 

 scent to carry them all along with their sterns as straight as 

 tobacco pipes — as Mr. Tom Smith liked to see them — a 

 rare thing with foxhounds. Nor do the Queen's Hounds 

 profess, like the St. Huberts, to take a line along the bottom 

 of a stream, that is, under water, as tunefully as along 

 its soggy margin. A well-watered road is more likely to be 



