“There’s nothing so puzzling, nothing so difficult to comprehend by the best and most experienced of us,” said Trimbush, addressing me, “as the philosophy of scent; and yet, forsooth, we are to be told by a babbling puppy that——”
“Well, well!” said I, interrupting his irate speech, “don’t get in a passion about a trifle.”
“Right,” replied my friend, smoothing the bristling hackles on his back. “Quite right. Life is made up of trifles, as the hours are of seconds, days of hours, years of days, and ages of years. Life’s trifles are the atoms in unity, forming the whole.”
Not wishing to enter into a discussion of this sort, I led Trimbush back to the original subject by saying, “I should like to hear a little more about the philosophy of scent.”
“There is little more to add,” returned he, “as far as I know. Depending, as I have before said, on the weather, which changes sometimes three or four times in a day, and the state of the ground, the rule is, that it is invariably uncertain. In windy weather we are often accused of being wild and flashy; but the fact is, that the particles of scent being widely spread and wafted about, one hits it here, another there, and we fly from one to the other, each thinking that some are on the right line, and may slip away with it unseen down wind. There is nothing more tiresome than a gale of wind in hunting, both to us and men. We can’t hear each other, and they can’t hear us; and it is matter of doubt to me which is the worst of the two—a thick fog, or a blowing gusty wind. I may here remark,” continued Trimbush, “that there is a strange fact connected with scent, which I have not heard attempted to be accounted for. On the going off of a frost, we can run the drag hard, right up to the kennel, and yet be unable to run an inch afterwards.”
“That seems very singular,” said I.
“I suppose it to be,” resumed my companion, “that the scent clings to whatever the animal rubs against or passes over during the night; and having gone slowly, a greater portion is emitted, which is preserved by the frost, and the thaw having loosened the particles, enables us to take them up.”
“But how do you account for not being able to run after he is unkennelled?” asked I.
“Because his skin is cold; and going at a greater pace, there is not sufficient time for the small quantity of scent escaping to lie strong enough to overcome the exhalations from the ground, occasioned by the warmth of the day.”
This sage reasoning on the part of Trimbush made me feel very small in my own estimation, and I made up my mind to follow his advice for some time to come, and listen rather than give tongue.