LETTER XVIII
Before I proceed on my subject, give me leave to set you right in one particular, where I perceive you have misunderstood me. You say, that you little expected to see the abilities of a huntsman degraded beneath those of a whipper-in. This is a serious charge against me, as a sportsman; and, though I cannot admit that I have put the cart before the horse in the manner you are pleased to mention, yet you have made it necessary for me to explain myself farther.
I must therefore remind you, that I speak of my own country only; a country full of riot, where the covers are large, and where there is a chase full of deer and full of game. In such a country as this, you that know so well how necessary it is for a pack of fox-hounds to be steady, and to be kept together, ought not to wonder that I should prefer an excellent whipper-in to an excellent huntsman. No one knows better than yourself, how essential a good adjutant is to a regiment: believe me, a good whipper-in is not less necessary to a pack of fox-hounds: but I must beg you to observe, I mean only, that I could do better with mediocrity in the one than in the other. If I have written any thing in a former Letter that implies more, I beg leave to retract it in this. Yet I must confess to you, that a famous huntsman I am not very ambitious to have, unless it necessarily followed that he must have famous hounds; a conclusion that I cannot admit, as long as these so famous gentlemen will be continually attempting themselves to do, what would be much better done if left to their hounds: besides, they seldom are good servants, are always conceited, and sometimes impertinent. I am very well satisfied if my huntsman be acquainted with his country and his hounds; if he ride well up to them; and if he have some knowledge of the nature of the animal which he is in pursuit of: but so far am I from wishing him to be famous, that I hope he will still continue to think his hounds know best how to hunt a fox.
You say you agree with me, that a huntsman should stick close to his hounds. If, then, his place be fixed, and that of the first whipper-in (where you have two) be not; I cannot but think genius may be at least as useful in one as in the other: for instance, while the huntsman is riding to his headmost hounds, the whipper-in, if he have genius, may show it in various ways: he may clap forwards to any great earth that may, by chance, be open; he may sink the wind to halloo, or mob a fox, when the scent fails; he may keep him off his foil; he may stop the tail hounds, and get them forward; and has it frequently in his power to assist the hounds, without doing them any hurt, provided he should have sense to distinguish where he may be chiefly wanted. Besides, the most essential part of fox-hunting, the making and keeping the pack steady, depends entirely upon him; as a huntsman should seldom rate, and never flog, a hound. In short, I consider the first whipper-in as a second huntsman; and, to be perfect, he should be not less capable of hunting the hounds than the huntsman himself.
You cannot too much recommend to your whipper-in to get to the head of his hounds before he attempts to stop them. The rating behind is to little purpose, and, if they should be in cover, may prevent him from knowing who the culprits are. When your hounds are running a fox, he then should content himself with stopping such as are riotous, and should get them forward. They may be condemned upon the spot; but the punishment should be deferred till the next day, when they may be taken out on purpose to commit the fault, and suffer the punishment. I agree with you, that young hounds cannot be awed too much; yet suffer not your punishment of them to exceed their offence. I could wish to draw a line betwixt justice and barbarity.1
A whipper-in, while breaking-in young hounds, sometimes will rate them before they commit the fault: this may perhaps, prevent them for that time; but they will be just as ready to begin the next opportunity. Had he not better let them quite alone, till he see what they would be at? The discipline then may be proportioned to the degree of the offence. Whether a riotous young hound run little or much, is of small consequence, if he be not encouraged: it is the blood only that signifies, which in every kind of riot should carefully be prevented.2
My general orders to my whipper-in are, if, when he rate a hound, the hound does not mind him, to take him up immediately, and give him a severe flogging. Whippers-in are too apt to continue rating, even when they find that rating will not avail. There is but one way to stop such hounds, which is, to get to the heads of them. I also tell him, never, on any account, to strike a hound, unless the hound be at the same time sensible what it is for. What think you of the whipper-in who struck a hound as he was going to cover, because he was likely to be noisy afterwards—saying, “you will be noisy enough by and bye, I warrant you?” Whippers-in, when left to themselves, are rare judges of propriety. I wish they would never strike a hound that does not deserve it, and would strike those hard that do. They seldom distinguish sufficiently the degrees of offence which a dog may have committed, to proportion their punishment accordingly; and such is their stupidity, that, when they turn a hound after the huntsman, they will rate him as severely as if he had been guilty of the greatest fault.
It is seldom necessary to flog hounds to make them obedient, since obedience is the first lesson that they are taught; yet, if any should be more riotous than the rest, they may receive a few cuts in the morning, before they leave the kennel.
When hounds prove unsteady, every possible means should be taken to make them otherwise: a hare, or a deer, put into the kennel amongst them, may then be necessary. Huntsmen are too fond of kennel-discipline: you already know my opinion of it: I never allow it but in cases of great necessity: I then am always present myself, to prevent excess. To prevent an improper and barbarous use of such discipline, I have already told you, is one of the chief, objects of these Letters. If what Montaigne says be true, “that there is a certain general claim of kindness and benevolence which every creature has a right to from us,” surely we ought not to suffer unnecessary severity towards an animal to whom we are obliged for so much diversion: and what opinion must we have of the huntsman who inflicts it on one to whom he owes his daily bread?3
If any of my hounds be very riotous, they are taken out by themselves on the days when they do not hunt, and properly punished; and this is continued whilst my patience lasts, which, of course, depends on the value of the dog. It is a trial between the whipper-in, I think, generally prevails. If this method will not make them steady, no other can; they then are looked upon as incorrigible, and are put away.
Such hounds as are notorious offenders, should also feel the lash, and hear a rate, as they go to the cover; it may be a useful hint to them, and may prevent a severer flogging afterwards. A sensible whipper-in will wait his opportunity to single out his hound; he will then hit him hard, and rate him well; whilst a foolish one will often hit a dog that he did not intend to strike; will ride full gallop into the midst of the hounds; will, perhaps, ride over some of the best of them, and put the whole pack into confusion: this is a manœuvre that I cannot bear to see.
Have-a-care! are words which seldom do any harm; since hounds, when they are on a right scent, will not mind them. Let your whipper-in be careful how he encourage the hounds; that, improperly done, may spoil your pack.
A whipper-in will rate a hound, and then endeavour to flog him. A dog, after having been rated, will naturally avoid the whip. Tell your whipper-in whenever a hound shall deserve the lash, to hit him first and rate him afterwards.
When there are two whippers-in, one ought always to be forward; when there is only one, he, to be perfect, should be a very Mungo, here, there, and everywhere.
You will find it difficult to keep your people in their proper places: I have been obliged to stop back myself, to bring on hounds which my servants had left behind. I cannot give you a greater proof how necessary it is that a whipper-in should bring home all his hounds, than by telling you that I had lost an old hound for ten days, and sent all the country over to inquire after him; and at last, when I thought no more about him, in drawing a large cover in the country where he had been lost, he joined the pack; he was exceedingly emaciated, and it was a long time before he recovered. How he subsisted all that time, I cannot imagine. When any of your hounds may be missing, you should send the whipper-in back immediately to look for them: it will teach him to keep them more together.
The getting forward the tail hounds is a necessary part of fox-hunting, in which you will find a good whipper-in of the greatest use. He must also get forward himself at times, when the huntsman is not with the hounds; but the second whipper-in (who frequently is a young lad, ignorant of his business) on no account ought to encourage or rate a hound, but when he is quite certain that it is right to do it; nor is he ever to get forward, so long as a single hound remains behind.
Halloo forward, is certainly a necessary and a good halloo but is it not used too indiscriminately? it is forever in the mouth of a whipper-in. If your hounds be never used to that halloo till after a fox be found, you will see them fly to it. At other times, other halloos will answer the purpose of getting them on as well. Halloo forward being used as soon as the game is on foot, it seems as if another halloo were necessary, to denote the breaking cover. Away! Away! might answer that purpose. Gentlemen who are kind enough to stop back to assist hounds, should have notice given them when the hounds leave the cover.
Most huntsmen, I believe, are jealous of the whipper-in: they frequently look on him as a successor, and therefore do not very readily admit him into the kennel; yet, in my opinion, it is necessary that he should go thither; for he ought to be well acquainted with the hounds, who should know and follow him, as well as the huntsman.
To recapitulate what I have already said. If your whipper-in be bold and active; be a good and careful horseman; have a good ear, and a clear voice; if, as I said, he be a very Mungo, having, at the same time, judgment to distinguish where he can be of most use; if, joined to these, he be above the foolish conceit of killing a fox without the huntsman; but, on the contrary, be disposed to assist him all he can—he then is a perfect whipper-in.
I am sorry to hear that your hounds are so unsteady. It is scarcely possible to have sport with unsteady hounds: they are half tired before the fox is found, and are not to be depended upon afterwards. It is a great pleasure, when a hound challenges, to be certain that he is right: it is a cruel disappointment to hear a rate immediately succeed it, and the smacking of whips instead of halloos of encouragement. A few riotous and determined hounds do a deal of mischief in a pack. Never, when you can avoid it, put them among the rest; let them be taken out by themselves, and well chastised; and if you find them incorrigible, hang them. The common saying, Evil communications corrupt good manners, holds good with regard to hounds; they are easily corrupted. The separating of the riotous ones from those which are steady, answers many good purposes: it not only prevents the latter from getting the blood which they should not, but it also prevents them from being overawed by the smacking of whips, which is too apt to obstruct drawing and going deep into cover. A couple of hounds, which I received from a neighbour last year, were hurtful to my pack: they had run with a pack of harriers, and, as I soon found, were never afterwards to be broken from hare. It was the beginning of the season; covers were thick, hares in plenty, and we seldom killed less than five or six in a morning. The pack, at last, got so much blood, that they would hunt them as if they were designed to hunt nothing else. I parted with that couple of hounds; and the others, by proper management, are become as steady as they were before. You will remind me, perhaps, that they were draft-hounds: it is true, they were so; but they were three or four years hunters; an age when they might be supposed to have known better. I advise you, unless a known good pack of hounds are to be disposed of, not to accept old hounds. I mention this, to encourage the breeding of hounds, and as the likeliest means of getting a handsome, good, and steady pack. Though I give you this advice, it is true, I have accepted draft-hounds myself, and they have been very good; but they were the gift of the friend mentioned by me in a former Letter,4 to whom I have already acknowledged many obligations; and unless you meet with such a one, old hounds will not prove worthy your acceptance: besides, they may bring vices enough along with them to spoil your whole pack. If old hounds should be unsteady, it may not be in your power to make them otherwise; and I can assure you from experience, that an unsteady old hound will give you more trouble than all your young ones: the latter will at least stop; but an obstinate old hound will frequently run mute, if he find that he can run no other way: besides, old hounds that are unacquainted with your people, will not readily hunt for them as they ought; and such as were steady in their own pack may become unsteady in yours. I once saw an extraordinary instance of this, when I kept harriers. Hunting one day on the downs, a well-known fox-hound of a neighbouring gentleman came and joined us; and as he both ran faster than we did, and skirted more, he broke every fault, and killed many hares. I saw this hound often in his own pack afterwards, where he was perfectly steady; and though he constantly hunted in covers where hares were in great plenty, I never remember to have seen him run one step after them.
A change of country, also, will sometimes occasion a difference in the steadiness of hounds. My hounds hunt frequently in Cranborn Chase, and are steady from deer; yet I once knew them run an outlying deer, which they unexpectedly found in a distant country.
I am sorry to hear that so bad an accident has happened to your pack, as that of killing sheep; but I apprehend from your account of it, that it proceeded from idleness, rather than vice. The manner in which the sheep were killed, may give you some insight into it; old practitioners generally seizing by the neck, and seldom, if ever, behind. This, like other vices, sometimes runs in the blood: in an old hound it is, I believe, incorrigible: the best way, therefore, will be to hang all those which, after two or three whippings, cannot be cured of it. In some countries, hounds are more inclined to kill sheep than they are in others. Hounds may be steady in countries where the covers are fenced, and sheep are only to be seen in flocks, either in large fields or on open downs; and the same hounds may be unsteady in forests and heathy countries, where the sheep are not less wild than the deer. However, hounds, should they stir but a step after them, should undergo the severest discipline: if young hounds do it from idleness, that, and plenty of work, may reclaim them: for old hounds guilty of this vice, I know, as I said before, of but one sure remedy —the halter.
Though I so strongly recommend to you to make your hounds steady, from having seen unsteady packs, yet I must also add that I have frequently seen the men even more unsteady than the hounds. It is shocking to hear hounds halloo’d one minute and rated the next: nothing offends a good sportsman so much, or is in itself so hurtful. I will give you an instance of the danger of it:—My beagles were remarkably steady: they hunted hare in Cranborn Chase, where deer are in great plenty, and would draw for hours, without taking the least notice of them. When tired of hare-hunting, I was inclined to try if I could find any diversion in hunting of fallow deer. I had been told that it would be impossible to do it with those hounds that had been made steady from them; and, to put it to the trial, I took them into a cover of my own, which has many ridings cut in it, and where are many deer. The first deer that we saw we halloo’d; and, by great encouragement and constant hallooing, there were but few of these steady hounds but would run the scent. They hunted deer constantly from that day, and never lost one afterwards. Dogs are sensible animals: they soon find out what is required of them, when we do not confuse them by our own heedlessness: when we encourage them to hunt a scent which they have been rated from, and perhaps severely chastised for hunting, they must needs think us cruel, capricious, and inconsistent.5
If you know any pack that is very unsteady, depend upon it, either no care has been taken in entering the young hounds to make them steady, or else the men afterwards, by hallooing them on improperly, and to a wrong scent, have forced them to become so.
The first day of the season, I advise you to take out your pack where you have least riot, and where you are most sure to find; for, notwithstanding their steadiness at the end of the last season, long rest may have made them otherwise. If you have any hounds more vicious than the rest, they should be left at home a day or two, till the others are well in blood. Your people, without doubt, will be particularly cautious, at the beginning of the season, what hounds they halloo to: should they be encouraged on a wrong scent, it will be a great hurt to them.
The first day that you hunt in the forest, be equally cautious what hounds you take out. All should be steady from deer: you may afterwards put others to them, a few at a time. I have seen a pack draw steadily enough, and yet, when running hard, fall on a weak deer, and rest as contented as if they had killed their fox. These hounds were not chastised, though caught in the fact, but were suffered to draw on for a fresh fox: I would rather they had undergone severe discipline. The finding of another fox with them afterwards, might then have been of service; otherwise, in my opinion, it could only serve to encourage them in the vice, and make them worse and worse.
I must mention an instance of extraordinary sagacity in a fox-beagle that once belonged to the Duke of Cumberland. I entered him at hare, to which he was immediately so steady, that he would run nothing else. When a fox was found by the beagles, which sometimes happened, he would instantly come to the heels of the huntsman’s horse. Some years afterwards I hunted fox only, and, though I parted with most of the others, I kept him. He went out constantly with the pack; and, as hares were scarce in the country that I then hunted, he did no hurt: the moment a fox was found, he came to the horse’s heels. This continued some time, till, catching view of a fox that was sinking, he ran in with the rest, and was well blooded. He, from that time to the day of his death, was not only as steady a hound to fox as ever I knew, but became also our very best finder. I bred some buck-hounds from him, and they are remarkable for never changing from a hunted deer.
Your huntsman’s weekly return is a very curious one: he is particularly happy in the spelling. The following letter, which is in the same style, may make you laugh, and is, perhaps, no unsuitable return for yours.
Sir.
Honored6 … I have been out with the hounds this day to ayer the frost is very bad the hounds are all pure well at present and horses shepard has had a misfortin with his mare she hung harself with the holter and throd har self and broak har neck and frac tard skul so we was forsd to nock har In the head from your ever dutyful Humbel Sarvant
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Wednesday evening.
