Part 9

“Will, where’s the terrier?”

“Got none, my lord.”

“Was ever the like? Seventeen years I have hunted with these hounds, and though every field in this country is full of drains, they have never had a terrier that was worth hanging. Jack, go and fetch the farmer’s terrier; be off like a shot! How can they expect to save their poultry if they do not put gratings to their drains? Without them it is impossible for hounds to kill their foxes.”

Having by this time recovered my breath, I began to move away from the entrance, when to my surprise I found that there were no less than three foxes in the drain beside myself. Having with great difficulty forced myself past the first I came against, and whilst waiting anxiously the result, we were all much frightened by suddenly seeing a glimpse of light some distance up the drain beyond us. The men had dug a hole through the top of the drain at that spot; and shortly after this we heard them trying to force a rough terrier of the real Makerston breed to enter; they at length succeeded, when he immediately came down straight towards us. Not a little alarmed, and each of us struggling and striving to get away first, out we all bolted, with the terrier close at our heels. The scene which followed it is almost impossible to describe. The first fox was pursued by the greatest number of hounds, and, as I came second, the next greatest number followed me; and so after us they came; but our sally was so sudden that we fortunately had gained the start of them by some ten or twenty yards.

I think I still hear the voice of old Will crying out, “Every hound has got a fox!” As I jumped over the fence, he was still holding his whip in the air, undecided which of the four lots (into which the hounds had divided) he should follow. So good was the scent on that day, that although only about four couples of hounds followed me, I went straight to another drain; and, strange to say, there found another of the same party as before, which accounted for the two first lots of hounds leaving a short time before they ran up to the earth. Here our lives were again in danger; and, hearing the men again digging at some distance, I profited by what had passed, and pushed beyond it. My unfortunate fellow was again forced out by the same terrier, and fell a victim to our foes; who, not suspecting that another fox was in the earth, again left me.

“Well, Will, do you recollect the foresay about there being half a dozen foxes in the last drain?”

“I do, my lord; and now the gentleman’s foresays have all been fulfilled from beginning to end.”

During the time they were waiting for the terrier at the last drain, and doubting whether he could be found, a farmer was filling in the stones at the entrance of the drain, and being asked what he was about, he answered,—“Why, if the terrier don’t come, we will starve the fox to death, which is easy to do in this drain. He has had mony fowls; about forty I ken.”

“What’s that?” said the Southron. “Pretty sort of encouragement for a gentleman to spend so much money in the country in keeping hounds. Why, the Duke pays more money to the farmers in one week than all the poultry in the hunt would sell for in a twelvemonth; to say nothing of all that is spent in it by the gentlemen who hunt. If there were no foxes there would be no hounds.”

“Vary true, vary true,” was the reply; “but Mr. Williamson is raather too closefisted when he pays a bittie o’ the Duke’s siller.”

The worst part of the story, as relates to ourselves, remains to be told, namely, that when they left a hard bargain was going on for the purchase of the terrier which had driven us out of our retreat, and he was to be taken to the kennel for the same employment when required, which, sure enough, was often the case. Luckily for me he was not with the hounds a short time after, when I was again found by this pack, as I lay in a wood near Floors, belonging to the Duke of Roxburgh, who, though no fox-hunter, is one of our best friends, and gives his keepers strict orders never to destroy us. But for the absence of this terrier I must have been in jeopardy that day; for having heard the hounds running after another fox, I was just stepping away to a drain close to the Tweed, in a contrary direction, not before I was seen, and a few hounds got on my scent, which they followed until they reached the drain where I was. On being told of which, old Will, the huntsman, brought the rest of the hounds to the spot, determined to get me out. Tools were procured, and several attempts were made, but in vain. Some half-bred terriers were then sent for, but they would not venture near me, nor could they a second time be urged to go in. Other fruitless attempts were made, and a great part of the morning was lost in this way by a throng of hunters, and amongst them the noble master of the pack. Whilst this was going on, and they were looking at and admiring the beauties of the stately river, a large salmon leaped clean out of the water, as if on purpose to amuse or to tantalise them. Whereupon a gentleman present asked his Grace if it would give him pleasure to have a throw with a fly for such a fish. His fit reply might well be a source of satisfaction and pleasure to all who hunt in countries where his Grace has property.

“To tell the truth I care little for that kind of sport; but, as to the other, I am never perfectly happy unless I have on a red coat.”

All at length left the place exceedingly annoyed that the terrier, the hero of the former day, had not been with them. Probably the bargain for him was not completed, and consequently I escaped.

Wishing to return to my old haunts, I had got as far as a covert called the Hirsel, belonging to Lord Home, where I had not been long when one day I heard two reports, which turned out to be from the keeper’s gun, discharged at two innocent young fox-hound puppies, thus deliberately butchered for having strayed by chance from the hospitable home of the kind mistress whose pets they were, and whose gentle care and caresses they had so often enjoyed. You will not be surprised when I tell you that our race appears to be almost extinct about these woods.

After this tragical event I lost no time, but went to the farthest covert belonging to this estate, and nearly surrounded by Lord Elcho’s country. I hoped to be there as far as possible from danger, and thought myself secure, as the outside covert was kept quiet, and scarcely disturbed even by the hounds of the Duke in whose hunt it is retained. It is suspected that the keeper kills all of us foxes that he can in that part, because no hounds hunt it enough. He says that all the foxes in Lord Elcho’s country come there to be quiet. Be that as it may, the last time the hounds found me there they had before drawn all the other woods, and only found one fox, and that a mangy one. I was disturbed first by hearing Old Will cheering his hounds, as if he had just seen a fox, giving his cheer thus, “Hooi-here, here, here!” which, in any other country, would pass for a view-halloo.

After listening and expecting to hear the hounds in full cry, I found it was only his customary cry in drawing a whin covert, particularly when he wished his hounds to get into it. I noticed that they did not attend to the halloo so readily when a fox was really seen. Notwithstanding this, they understood their huntsman’s system well enough to make it no safe thing to be hunted by them. I soon left the covert, and when they had pursued me for some miles, and were getting nearer to me, they suddenly came to a check; on looking back, I saw the huntsman almost immediately take them away beyond the next large field, rather to the left of where my line was hitherto pointing; I suppose either because there was a flock of sheep in that field, or because he thought I had gone to a covert in that direction. If the hounds had had their time, they would have hit off the scent to the right of the field. The upshot was, that I, thinking that they had given me up, took the first opportunity of getting out of sight, not because I was tired and beaten, as some suppose must always be the case when we seek such places of refuge; which they soon ascertained was the case, for nearly as soon as the hounds had hunted up to the drain on one side of the road, I started off on the other, and though they had as good a start with me as they could wish for, I contrived to run away from them, owing to the scent not being good enough for hounds to kill a stout fox without assistance; and probably to the huntsman repeating his former mistake in making an injudicious forward cast when not wanted. He did not now venture to hold the hounds forward and across the line I came, or else they would have got on the scent, as I returned nearly the same way, which was ascertained by a hunter on his return home, a man having seen me.

Having escaped from this lively pack of hounds, I did not venture to remain in this part, but at once took up my abode near Foulden, where I was again found by Lord Elcho and his pack, though I fancied I had selected an out-of-the-way spot near the river Whitadder, with which part I was well acquainted, as his lordship has reason to know and to regret. After they had hunted me some time, finding myself distressed, I was induced to return to my old haunts, creeping along a narrow track by the side of the steep and rocky bank which overhung the river, the height of which, where I passed, was nearly a hundred feet. Several of these high-couraged hounds in attempting to follow me lost their footing, fell to the bottom, and were killed. It was only strange that a single hound escaped; and though I certainly did not intend to assist in preventing their destruction, yet such happened to be the case; for having waited, when in my narrow track, for some time, and thinking myself safe, I heard the piercing cry of a hound, which I then believed was following me. I ran straight along the top of the precipice, and was seen by the whipper-in and some of the hounds, and the noise they instantly made by hallooing a view with all their might, assisted by his lordship blowing his horn, attracted the notice of the other hounds, or they would otherwise have followed on the line to certain destruction. I attribute my escape to the powerful effect this event had on the feelings of the owner of the pack. Lest I should again lead them back to the same spot, he immediately took them off my scent and sent them home, and I flattered myself that we should never again see these hounds run to find a fox in this part of the country; for the anguish created in his lordship’s mind it is impossible for me to describe, although it may be easily imagined.

However, all my hopes of living a quiet life here were destroyed. A great friend of his Lordship’s, and of ours, Mr. Wilkie of Foulden, near where this occurred, and on whose rabbits I sometimes subsisted, immediately took measures to prevent the same calamity from happening again; and although it was hitherto pronounced an impossibility, he has, as far as I at present can judge of it, succeeded. It was managed by cutting away my narrow track at the edge of the rock which overhung the river. To do this required much labour and risk; but it was effected by suspending a ladder, which was fastened by strong ropes to stakes driven in the ground some distance above. I need not say that I watched the work with no great satisfaction; and as I saw the foundation of my once favourite track fall into the river below, when they gradually broke it away, it made my heart ache, I felt that I must now either stay and be killed, or move into another country. I decided on the latter.

Although I vowed in an hour of distress, when first hunted by the hounds there, never to run the risk of them again if I escaped, I recrossed the Tweed into England, and have taken up my quarters on one of the highest parts of the Cheviot Hills, hoping to find a safe retreat from them. There are, however, dangers to be dreaded there, as well as in every country where hounds are not kept to hunt us; but the system of destruction to be dreaded by me is one that is adopted on mountainous parts alone. The shepherds of the mountains on certain days gather together against us, armed with guns, and aided by dogs of all sorts, from the greyhound to the collie. The sagacity and docility of the latter are very astonishing; but the sagacity of an old dog of the fox-hound sort is superior to that of every other. The collie dog is taught by man what to do, whilst the old fox-hound teaches his master. Had it not been for the sagacity of the hound, I should have been spared many a perilous run. The shepherds pretend that the breed of the mountain fox is of a different kind from our own, and that the head of the male is larger. For my own part, I believe the animals to be of the same kind as ourselves, and to be merely larger altogether; for I have sometimes met one in my rambles. Their superior size may be accounted for as follows: having been born or bred in the wholesome air upon the mountains, where food, such as rabbits, is probably scarce, they find and fatten upon sheep which from various accidents die there. Having once got a taste for such food, it is not surprising that they will take a lamb, or attack an old one which has fallen through illness or neglect. Anxious as I am to protect my own race, I cannot blame the shepherds for waging war against the transgressors; as it is known that when once a fox has taken to such a habit, he seldom gives it up but with his life. Felons are to be found everywhere; but, as to ourselves, the following facts will prove that the generality of us are not guilty of charges frequently laid upon us. On the first day of February last, being the last day of pheasant shooting, I was lying in a thick plantation, in the middle of a park at Ladykirk, on the other side of the Tweed, which covered a space of ground not more than a quarter of an acre, when a party were shooting not far off, and I suddenly heard one of them exclaim, “Look out, there goes a fox! he jumped up close by me. There he goes, straight away. I wish the hounds were here.”

In the course of an hour after this, I was again startled by hearing, “Tally-ho! tally-ho! there goes another fox! Don’t mistake him for a hare, and shoot him; he’s close to you, in the clump between!” And then again the same loud voice,—“There he goes, right across the park; what a fine fellow he is!”

It shortly afterwards became my turn to exhibit. They came to the clump where I was, and a man who went in beyond directly called out, “There goes a hen pheasant, there go two, three!” and so on. He had just cried out, “That makes thirteen hen pheasants!” when a spaniel rushed into the thick bushes, and obliged me to face the whole party. A glorious cheering they gave me; and when they had expressed their surprise and satisfaction, the keeper assured them of his belief, that there were as many pheasants left as had been there at the beginning of the season, excepting those that had been shot by sportsmen. Now if I, or any of us, were so much given to destroy game as we are reported to be, there would not have been a pheasant left alive in a week’s time from the beginning of the season, whereas it was now nearly the end of it. This fortunately occurred in the presence of several persons, who saw all three of us. No less than five other foxes from the same park have been killed by Lord Elcho and his pack this season.

Hoping that I have given you all sufficient encouragement to induce you to make us a visit in the north, I conclude my story.

CONCLUSION

One more friend was about to begin his story. Whether he was from York, Lincoln, Nottingham, or Bedfordshire, was not ascertained, for on a sudden we were startled by the cawing of an old crow and the screams of a jay, which, added to the chatterings of a couple of magpies, warned us that daylight was appearing; and I was reluctantly obliged to request that his story might be deferred to some future time, should we ever meet again, when we might all have more to relate concerning the inexhaustible subject of our lives. Chanticleer now clapped admiring wings, and sang out a loud applause. This excited the particular notice of one of our party, who exclaimed, “I’ll go round and have a sly bite at his tail, for ’tis a quiet retired place, and no one yet about.”

“Take heed,” said I, “that thou bring us not into trouble.”

Soon afterwards we were again interrupted by the clamour of those tell-tale birds; for it seems that our friend was returning without his intended booty, having been seen by the keeper, who fast approached towards us. Therefore, hastily bidding adieu until we should meet again, we all returned to our favourite coverts.

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