274 STAG-HUNTING RECOLLECTIONS 



looking greenclad gardes, lent colour and animation and 

 importance to the alleys and carrefoiirs of Fontainebleau or 

 Compiegne. I remember well the relais volant — it sounds like 

 an inn sign or the title of a ghost story — that is, the mounted 

 yeoman pricker, with five or six couple of hounds, theoretically 

 straining on plaited hair rope but really much embarrassed 

 by his horse's heels. But the relais volant was always an 

 exciting apparition, as he hastened hither and thither on the 

 spur in response #to some distant challenge from his compeers 

 of the horn. To judge by the appearance of the little band, 

 it was hot work for all parties. 



Now that hounds are bred and entered to hunt together, 

 it is hardly possible to defend the relay system, and its vogue 

 is very limited. The objections are numerous and obvious. 

 It is difficult enough under any circumstances to keep fifteen 

 or eighteen couple of hounds together in varied and extensive 

 woodlands, even when they are laid on all at one time. It 

 must be nearly impossible to keep twenty-five or thirty 

 couple together laid on at different times, and laid on in a 

 way which must be offensive and disappointing to high- 

 mettled, painstaking hounds ; for a relay is always laid on, if 

 possible, with the leading hound as he crosses an alley, and 

 a clever valet de chiens is the man who can get all his relay 

 off and on the line at the very head of the hunting pack. 



Kelays, apart from pageantry, may have had their uses 

 in old days, before constant crosses of English blood bred 

 the fast bdtard of to-day. The old French hounds hunted 

 all the better for being in great numbers. They were 

 always uttering speech and certifying knowledge to one 

 another ; the chain of communication could hardly be too 

 long. In voice and gesture there was little to choose between 

 the leading and the tail hounds, and a deer was probably 

 seldom at the pains of exerting himself. They killed him 

 very possibly as often, or oftener, than the faster packs of the 



