"Persons may compound for their HOUNDS at THIRTY POUNDS per annum."
Dogs, from their general utility, and the estimation they are invariably held in by their owners, have been thought worthy an ACT of PARLIAMENT formed solely for their protection; rendering them of proportional value with any other kind of property, and equally entitled to legal preservation. By this statute it is enacted, "If any person shall steal any dog, or dogs, of any kind or sort whatsoever, from the owner thereof, or from any person entrusted by the owner thereof with such dog or dogs; or shall sell, buy, receive, harbour, detain, or keep any dogs of any kind or sort whatsoever, knowing the same to have been stolen as aforesaid; every such person being convicted thereof upon the oath of one credible witness, before two Justices of the Peace, shall for the first offence forfeit and pay any sum not exceeding 30l. nor less than 20l. and the charges of conviction."
And "in case such penalty shall not be forthwith paid, the offender to be committed to gaol for any time not exceeding twelve months, nor less than six, or until the penalty and charges are paid. Any person guilty of a subsequent offence, to forfeit and pay any sum not exceeding 50l. nor less than 30l. together with the charges; which penalties to be paid, one moiety thereof to the informer, and the other to the poor of the parish. On non-payment, the offender to be imprisoned for any time not exceeding eighteen months, nor less than twelve, or until the penalty and charges shall be paid, and be publicly whipped. Justices may grant warrants to search for dogs stolen; and in case any such dog or dogs, or their skins, shall, upon such search, be found, to take and restore every such dog or skin to the owner; and the persons in whose custody any such dog or skin shall be found, are liable to the like penalties and punishments. Persons aggrieved may appeal to the quarter-sessions, and the determination there to be final."
DOCKING
.—The amputation of the tail is so called, from that part of the tail left to the body being called the DOCK. It is a very short and simple operation, attended with no danger, and may with yearlings be performed even with a common knife. A very slight cauterization with a hot-iron, and a little powdered rosin, immediately stops the bleeding, and a cure takes place in a few days. It was formerly a custom to dock horses close to the quarters, under the erroneous and ridiculous impression of making the horse strong in the spine: such idea and practice are, however, in the present more enlightened age, entirely relinquished.
DOUBLE
—a term in HARE HUNTING. The hare is said to double, when, being considerably ahead of the hounds, she throws herself to the right or left, and returns in a parallel line to the track she went before; getting into which, she is said to run the foil. If during the chase the lays down, she is then said to quat.
DRAG
—is a sporting term in HUNTING, and used exactly in the same sense with THE FOX, as trail is with THE HARE. Upon throwing THE HOUNDS into covert, to draw for a FOX, any single hound giving tongue, is said to CHALLENGE, and to have hit upon drag; that is, to have come upon the foot or scent of the fox, where he had been in the night or early part of the morning, before he retired to secrete himself for the day. When it was the custom to be at the covert side so soon as there was day-light sufficient to RIDE up to the HOUNDS, drag was speedily obtained; and in many instances a GOOD DRAG proved better than a bad chase; but in the present fashion of going to covert, and throwing off at mid-day, drag is but very little known, and but of trifling use if found; for the SCENT must, from the great length of time, have so generally died away, and so partially remained, that no expectation can be entertained of THE HOUNDS carrying it up to THE GAME.