Until the last field of corn is cut, cubs are spared their introduction
to the joys and sorrows of hunting; but at the end of harvest their
time is at hand. Few keepers look forward to the coming of hounds for
cubbing. When hounds do come there is nothing more disappointing to the
keeper than that they should not find the cubs, of whose dark deeds he
has been complaining all the summer. Not only does he lose the prospect
of a sovereign reward, but the cubs are still at large to carry on
their havoc, while he may appear to have been crying wolf where there
were no wolves; the loss of the sovereign is much less to him than the
loss of his credit and the prospective loss of his birds. Different
hunts have different methods of rewarding keepers whose cubs are found
by hounds. One hunt works on the irrational plan of giving a keeper
a sovereign for each litter found, and ten shillings extra if a cub
is killed. This is almost as much as to ask the keeper to take steps
towards handicapping the cubs when the pack presses. The keeper knows
how important it is that the young entry shall taste blood at this
time, and he knows that if scent fails, the best way to ensure a kill
is to allow the cub to run to ground. Instead of completely stopping an
earth, he arranges a slight barricade of twigs; and then he may know,
by whether the cub has broken the barricade or not, if it has run to
ground. He takes care to have a spade and a pick-axe close at hand. The
well-intentioned reward really ends in spoiling sport.
* * * * *
"Various"--the Landrail
In the bag of September partridge-shooting, the landrail is often the
only bird booked under the heading "Various," save for an occasional
wood-pigeon; at any rate, many look to the landrail to fill the
"Various" column, if they often look in vain. On a calm day, the
landrail is a weird mark, with its heavy, laboured flight, and its
dangling legs; the bird hardly suggests a sporting shot. But few who
have shot landrails have not also missed them. Landrails will even put
to shame the sportsman who has been bagging his brace of partridges
with wearisome monotony. So slow, as a rule, is the landrail in
heading away, after its silent rising from sainfoin or clover, that
we have seen one bagged by a thrown stick, another knocked down by a
keeper's partridge-carrier, as he held it in his hand, and another
caught on the wing by a dog; of course this is nothing uncommon. We
have even seen a terrier point and pounce on a landrail that was
crouching beneath its nose. But when a fair wind is blowing, the slow
landrail becomes as difficult a mark to hit as a snipe or a woodcock.
And a landrail has a disappointing habit of dropping when it comes to a
hedge, for all the world like a dead bird, though very much alive.
* * * * *