FOX-HUNTING IX VIRGINIA. 535 



seeing, or riding well, and with pleasure and safety. Some 

 haye a run any day in the year they may have a mind to do 

 it. Fox-hunting is for pleasure, for health, and for the 

 acquirement of skill on horseback, and it ought not to be 

 pursued under circumstances dangerous to the health of 

 the hunter, nor cruel to his horse or hound; as when the 

 weather is severe and the ground icy, or soft and miry. The 

 best weather is a temperature of about 60° Fahrenheit, and 

 a relative humidity of about 75°, clear, and without wind 

 beyond a moderate breeze. This will be an atmosphere 

 sufficiently moist for good scent and not too cool for the 

 rapid movements of the chase, which greatly increases evap- 

 oration, both from the pulmonary and cutaneous surfaces, 

 which of course implies rapid loss of animal heat; and a 

 great strain is thereby thrown upon both the great organs 

 of circulation and respiration, in man and beast. 



Therefore it is that dry, cool wind makes the very worst 

 hunting- weather, and therefore it is that horses have com- 

 monly made their greatest records on the turf on very hot 

 days. Observations made by the writer on temperature 

 and relative humidity, in connection with the air-supply of 

 the Hall of Representatives at Washington, led him to the 

 conclusion that a temperature of 60° Fahrenheit, and a 

 relative humidity of 75°, gives us our most delightful vernal 

 and autumnal weather, and those conditions are recom- 

 mended as constituting nearly the optimum of hunting- 

 weather. In such weather, Foxes lie much in the open 

 fields, or on the border of some glade or open woodland. 

 We often ousted them from such spots, before Setters and 

 Pointers, when out shooting on such autumn days. 



In describing the modus operandi of the hunt, I will 

 detail our own usual practice; not that it is the best prac- 

 tice, but it is the result of long experience, and has been 

 found satisfactory in the region where we were accustomed 

 to hunt. It is by no means necessary to get up shortly after 

 midnight, and hastily swallow a cold, uncomfortable break- 

 fast; to be in the saddle and unkennel the hounds while it is 

 yet dark. It is better to eat a comfortable early breakfast, 



