206 PREPARATIONS FOR CUB-HUNTING. 



every means in their power the warmth by which 

 all natm^e is revived and nourished. No kennel is 

 perfect without the means of warm ventilation, 

 which may easily be supplied by flues, where the 

 copper of the boiling-house is contiguous, as it 

 generally is, to the lodging-houses." 



A month previous to cub-hunting, the young 

 hounds should be prepared for their work by long 

 exercise, and trotting briskly along with the 

 horses over turf or through grassy lanes, which 

 may be increased to a gallop at last when an 

 opportunity occurs for stretching their limbs over 

 open downs, by which you will be enabled to judge 

 also of their speed and style of going ; but it must 

 be borne in mind that getting hounds as well 

 as horses into condition is a gradual process, from 

 walking to trotting, and last of all galloping. 

 Many huntsmen, however, commence without any 

 such preliminary training, working their hounds 

 into condition, rather than take the trouble to get 

 them into condition to work, and from this negli- 

 gence the hounds suffer very severely sometimes in 

 their first day's hunting, particularly should the 

 weather be hot and the ground hard, which is 

 generally the case during the month of August 

 and beginning of September. 



Cub-hvmting is, in my opinion, the most trying 



