DORSET’S STORY
I was born in Cranborne Chace, which is in Mr. Farquharson’s hunt, and it was here that I first heard the sound of a huntsman’s voice, the voice of old Ben Jennings; and melodious as it might have been considered by others, it was any thing but agreeable to my ear when he used it to cheer on his hounds, which appeared so well to understand it. It frequently was the cause of my leaving this large covert. I returned to it because the hounds were apt to get on the scent of another fox. The voice became at last so familiar to me that I heeded it not, but rather found amusement in it, taking little trouble to be out of hearing of it when the hounds were hunting me; but another season came, and great was the difference. I lay in a favourite covert called Short Wood, when I was startled by another voice instead of old Ben’s, that of the new huntsman, Treadwell’s, clear and beautiful—not so powerful as that which I had been used to of late, nor was it vox et præterea nihil; for his system was one which soon made me give up listening when the hounds were pursuing. I found that I had now no longer time to wait and hang about as I had done. I was obliged to get away as fast as I could, and had enough to do to escape from the new man, whose coolness and perseverance frightened me. My first escape was owing to an imperfect cast which he made when the hounds had come to a check in a field, where there was a flock of sheep, for instead of taking the hounds entirely round and close under the hedge, beginning at the left hand, he missed that corner for about fifty yards, where it happened that I had gone through the fence, and by the time he had taken them close all round every where else and held them on forward, time was lost, and the hounds got on the scent exactly opposite. Although it now became slow hunting, I did not feel safe until I heard him blow his horn to go home. I believe that this kind of mistake, or rather neglect, has been frequent on the part of other huntsmen by whom I have been hunted. Be that as it may, one or two escapes from this able man and his pack were sufficient to induce me to get quickly into another hunt out of his way. Those escapes may be attributed to the want of scent, and they will not seem surprising, if the time be calculated which was lost at every check, whilst I was going on without listening as the hare always does. Having stopped some little time in a strong covert of gorse in an open down, in Mr. Drax’s country, south of Blandford, and close adjoining to Lord Portman’s, I was one morning annoyed by hearing the voice of Mr. Drax’s huntsman, John Last, who was drawing the covert with his hounds, by which I was shortly after surrounded. Being ignorant of the runs and tracks in the gorse, I was so pressed by them that I sprung upon the top of the gorse, and ran along it for a few yards, but the hallooing of the hunters soon frightened me down again. At length I went straight away across the down in view of all the hunters, and had not gone more than a hundred yards before a large man on a heavy gray horse rode between me and the covert, and began hallooing in the most frightful manner, at the same time waving his hat as if he was out of his mind: the consequence of which was, that the hounds, which were hunting me closely out of the covert, immediately they saw and heard him threw up their heads and ran wildly after him, expecting to see me, which fortunately they did not, as I had by that time just got beyond a small elevation in the down, which prevented the man also from seeing me. I turned directly to the left. He now found out the mischief he had done by causing the hounds to lift their heads, and galloped on still farther, hoping to get another view of me, but in vain, as I had sunk into a small valley, and he luckily turned the hounds in a direction opposite to that in which I had gone. The scene at this time defies description. “What are you at, you crazy old man? You have lost our fox!” and endless execrations were lavished on him. I believe this circumstance saved my life; for had it not occurred, the hounds would have had me in view for three miles across the downs, and although it was some little time before they got on my scent again, they came after me at a most terrific pace, which fortunately, however, was slackened on their crossing the road and having to climb over a wall into the grounds adjoining some immense woods, through the whole of which they hunted me again at a good pace, and straight on for nine or ten miles, till I was almost exhausted; luckily they were stopped when crossing a field where there was a flock of sheep, no one being there to assist them. Shortly I heard in a loud voice, “John! Where is John?” and finding that they were not likely to get much assistance from the huntsman, I quietly retraced my steps towards the place from which I started, but remained there for a short time only.
Gone Away. By Henry Alken.
I was again lying one morning in a piece of gorse near the Down House, when I was waked by hearing what I thought was the whistle of the keeper, but which turned out to be that of Lord Portman’s huntsman, whose hounds were all around me before I was aware. The men on horseback were scattered in all directions over the down, and it would have served them right if they had lost their day’s sport, which they very nearly did, as I stole away to a large rabbit earth close by, into which I ran.
Unluckily some of the hounds got on my scent and hunted it up to the earth, where they marked it by stopping and baying. Shortly after this two or three of the hunters rode up, and I heard the following words: “Not worth saving: get him out and give him to the hounds; he can’t run a yard.” However, it was decided that I should have a chance, as they called it; and a pretty chance it was. I was dug out, put into a sack, and given to the whipper-in, with orders to turn me out on the down. Something was said about cutting my hamstrings, in order to lame me, and one wished to cut off my brush; and that it was not done was a great disappointment to the wretch. I was turned out at only about a hundred yards from the pack, but contrived to reach a hedge just as one of the leading hounds had got close to me, when I turned short to the left down the narrow ditch. The hounds all sprang over the fence, and then, not seeing me there, fortunately turned first to the right; and before they had found out that I had gone down the ditch I had got out on the other side again, and ran to a corner, when I turned through it again into another cross-hedge. By these means I got clear off before they had another sight of me, for they overran my line of scent a little when they got back on the down on my track. I well recollect hearing the huntsman calling loudly to the whipper-in to get on and head the fox from going to the woods; but he, poor thing, was in a state of too much excitement to understand what was meant, and even if he had understood, it would have been a fruitless attempt to stop me from making my point to reach a wood or place of safety on such an occasion, even if my first attempts had been prevented. I may flatter myself that a hundred witnesses are ready to pronounce it as clever an escape as was ever effected by a fox in similar circumstances. For the future they will not say that a fox cannot run, and condemn him to be given to the hounds, merely for running into an earth.
