Hzmting Sketches 257 



he was such a determined hunter when " at walk." 

 Perhaps Sir Charles did not take much pressing to give 

 him a chance. He entered at once, and from the very 

 first was one of the keenest hounds in the pack. There 

 was no question of drafting him then. He was so 

 much more powerful than poor old " Layman," that the 

 latter had to knock under at once and relinquish the 

 coveted head to his younger rival. 



If anything, old " Eosebud," a curious-coloured mealy 

 or badger-pied hound, was still more dear to Sir Charles 

 than even " Layman." He was wont to say that she had 

 NEVER made a mistake, and she had extraordinary low- 

 scenting powers. On the driest road, or the most dusty 

 of fallows, when not another hound could own the line 

 at all, old " Eosebud " would just keep slowly moving 

 along the line, perhaps for half a mile at a time, when 

 suddenly the others would catch the scent as we got 

 upon better ground, and many is the fox that was 

 eventually killed through " Eosebud " having been able 

 to keep to the line, without Sir Charles having had to 

 make a cast to recover it. She was a hound, too, of 

 tremendous courage, and if a fox was at bay in a tight 

 corner " Eosebud " was usually let in to draw him. 

 Sir Charles was in the habit of constantly killing foxes 

 in unlooked-for situations, and he seemed to have a 

 natural instinct to guide him as to when a fox was 

 likely to have secreted himself about houses, farm- 

 buildings, or similar places. One day we ran a fox into 

 Moor Monkton village, and Sir Charles and " Eosebud " 

 soon produced it out of a tub of oatmeal in an old 

 woman's cottage, the latter never even having observed 

 the entrance of the fox into her kitchen. On another 

 17 



