326 *HE ZOOLOGISt. 



After pointing out that the best season for Fox-hunting is in 

 the months of November, December, January, February, and 

 March, and that the hounds or Beagles generally made use of are 

 such that have good mettle, are stout and well-quartered, and 

 should differ according to the country where they are hunted — 

 the northern hound and the southern beagle making a good 

 strain for this sport — he proceeds to describe " the method now 

 observed in hunting the Fox." The first thing, he says, was to 

 find the " earth," and the night before hunting to stop all the 

 holes, " except the main hole that is most beaten, which stop 

 not until daybreak for fear of stopping him in" — very good 

 advice. This done, the huntsman was to draw the wood or 

 covert with a few steady hounds only, and not to throw in the 

 rest of the pack until the others had found their Fox and were 

 on his line. The Fox then finding himself so hotly pursued that 

 he cannot stay in the coverts he is acquainted with — 



" Is unwillingly forced to forsake them, and trust wholly to his feet, 

 leading them from wood to wood, a ring of four, six, or ten miles, and some- 

 times endways about twenty miles, trying all the earths he knows, which 

 as near as possible should be stopped the night before as aforesaid." 



" Many times they kill the Fox upon the turf; but if he gets to 

 an J earth,' and enters it, they cry Ho-up, as at the death, supposing the 

 chase ended, and blow a horn to call in the company." 



A little lower down (p. 89) our author remarks : — " Some- 

 times he is reserved alive, and hunted another day, which is 

 called a bag-fox" So that bag-foxes were known two centuries 

 ago, and Fox-hunting then was pretty much what it is now, 

 except that, with improved breeding, hounds are now much 

 faster and stauncher than they used to be. It is strange that in 

 the ' Badminton ' Volume on Hunting the writer of the first 

 chapter on the history and literature of hunting should have 

 committed himself to the statement (p. 33) that " Fox-hunting, 

 as we know it now, may be said to have come in with this 

 century." 



With this brief reference to the subject I must be content. 

 It would be beside my present purpose to trace the history or 

 development of Fox-hunting in England, or to refer to the details 

 of a sport on which so many and such excellent books have been 

 written. But as many interesting features in the character of 

 the Fox have been noted by observant Fox-hunters, it will not 



