There are divers kinds of horns, that is to say bugles, great Abbot's, hunter's horns, Ruets (trumpets), small Forester's horns and meaner horns of two kinds. That one kind is waxed with green wax and greater of sound, and they be best for good hunters, therefore will I devise how and in what fashion they should be driven. First a good hunter's horn should be driven of two spans in length, and not much more nor much less, and not too crooked neither too straight, but that the flue be three or four fingers uppermore than the head, that unlearned[173] hunters call the great end of the horn. And also that it be as great and hollow driven as it can for the length, and that it be shorter on the side of the baldric[174] than at the nether end. And that the head be as wide as it can be, and always driven smaller and smaller to the flue, and that it be well waxed thicker or thinner according as the hunter thinks that it will sound best. And that it be the length of the horn from the flue to the binding, and also that it be not too small driven from the binding to the flue, for if it be the horn will be too mean of sound. As for horns for fewterers[175] and woodmen, I speak not for every small horn and other mean horn unwaxed be good enough for them.
[173] Shirley MS.: "lewed," i.e. laewed or unlearned (Stratmann).
[174] Baldric, the belt on which the horn was carried.
[175] Fewterer, the man who held the greyhounds in slips or couples.
CHAPTER XXIII
HOW A MAN SHOULD LEAD HIS GROOM IN QUEST FOR TO KNOW A HART BY HIS TRACE
Then should his groom lead his lymer (tracking hound) in quest after him in the morning, and teach him to know what difference is between a hart's trace and a hind's. As I have said before, this word quest is a term of hart hunters beyond the sea, and is as much for to say as when the hunter goeth to find of a hart and to harbour him. For to know a great hart's trace from a young, and to know the trace of a young deer of antler from a hind's, and how many judgments and what knowledge there be, and for to make more certain thereof, he should have an old hart's foot and a young hart's and a hind's foot also, and should put it in hard earth and in soft, and once put it fast in the earth as though the hart were hunted and another time soft, as if the hart went a pase (slowly), thereby he may advise him to know the differences of a hart's feet, and he shall find that there is no deer so young if he be from a brocket upwards, that his talon (heel) is not larger and better and hath greater ergots (dew claws) than
THE MASTER TEACHING HIS HUNTSMAN HOW TO QUEST FOR THE HART WITH THE LIMER OR TRACKHOUND
(From MS. f. fr. 616, Bib. Nat., Paris)