I had the excellent fortune, begins Ringwood’s memoir, to be put at walk at a farm-house, where I enjoyed the treatment observed to all the animals under the care and protection of the farmer and his wife—that of universal kindness. Sweet milk, meal, and broth were my provisions; and I never was without a clean, dry, and warm bed. Basking in the sun, playing with the shepherd’s dog, following the men at work, and in a complete state of perfect freedom, my early puppyhood passed. I mention these apparently trifling circumstances, because so much depends, as will be shown hereafter, upon the way in which we are brought up. I was one of a litter of five, consisting of three brothers and two sisters, and each had been placed at a separate walk; so that, until we were sent to the kennel to be drafted, we had not seen each other since the day of separation.

Sorry as I was to leave my kind benefactors, still I felt no small degree of pride as, on a bright, sunny, spring morning, I was led into a court of the kennel, and met with greater admiration from the huntsmen and whips than any other of the young entry therein assembled, consisting of eleven couples and a half.

“Upon my word,” said the huntsman, looking at me carefully from head to stern, “I don’t think that I ever saw such a beauty in my life. Such deep quarters, straight legs, round feet, and broad back are not to be met with every day, mind ye.”

“Look at them shoulders and elbows too,” rejoined the first whip.

“And what a muzzle!” returned the second.

“Bless’d if he ain’t perfect symmetry!” echoed the feeder, after a long and silent gaze.

“I do think he is,” added the huntsman, emphatically. “Or if he isn’t, I can’t see a bad point in him.”

“That shows what the walk will do,” said the feeder, an old grey-headed man, pointing to four of our company. “Nobody would believe those were of the same litter, didn’t they know it.”

But for this I should not have recognised my brothers and sisters, who certainly bore a very different appearance from that given of me by the huntsman. As we appeared strangers to each other, I at once made myself known, and inquired after their health and treatment since we last met.

“Oh,” replied one of my brothers, snappishly, “I was sent to the village ale-house, where I had to pick up my own living, and got more kicks than good will. I was always in somebody’s way, try as I did to keep out of it; and the consequence is, I can’t run a mile without feeling as if my back’s broken. We don’t always die on the day we are killed,” continued he.

“As for me,” said my other fraternal relative—a mangy, out-of-the-elbow, shy-looking, down-cast hound—“I was tied up from one month’s end to another at a butcher’s shop, with nothing to eat but the offal from the slaughter-house. I never, scarcely, was let loose, except to fight with one of the bull-dogs or terriers chained in the yard with me; but as I was always over-matched when I fought, and got well thrashed when I refused, the end was the same in either case. The best part of a hound,” continued he, “as the best part of a horse, goes in at the mouth; and as none, since I was a sucker, has gone into mine, I suppose I must consider myself no better than I should be; and I fear,” concluded he, with a sorrowful expression, “not so good.”

“Let me hope that my sisters were more fortunate,” said I.

“We were together in the same village,” replied one, “although at different homes. I was at the saddler’s and my sister at the miller’s, and both shared the common hardships of being continually worried by a set of idle boys. Stoned, hallooed at, kettles tied to our tails, and all kinds of tricks were played upon us. Whenever anything eatable was missed or stolen, it was invariably laid to our charge; so that we could not even put our heads into a doorway without having a stick or a broom flung at us. Day after day this was our treatment, and although we did not suffer from a scarcity of food, yet from being obliged to shift for ourselves in getting beds where we could find them, sometimes cold, sometimes wet, and no system being observed in either our meals or lodgings, we were seldom without lameness or ill-health of one kind or other.”

My sister was about giving the further details of their grievances, when the second whip, a fine, young, athletic man, interrupted her narration by observing that “he would draft all the litter but me.”

“No, no,” returned the feeder, shaking his head. “You’ll not find the Squire do that: we must keep ’em for their blood.”

“Come,” added the huntsman, turning upon his heel, “they’re all in now, and to-morrow will show what are to be entered. We’ve no voice in the matter.”

“And don’t want to have,” rejoined the feeder, “with such a master as the Squire is.”

Soon after my entry I was taken under the protection of an old hound called Trimbush, and the favourite one in the pack. He had been hunted six seasons, and, as may be supposed, was awake to every wrinkle.

“Hounds, like men,” said he, one day, as we stretched ourselves together in the shade of a large chestnut-tree overhanging the court, “should first learn their duties, and then perform them. Now, young-un, I’ve taken a fancy to you,” continued he, giving me a playful flip with the tip of his stern; “and if you follow my advice you will save yourself many a stinging cut from our Whip’s double-thong. He hits terribly hard, I assure ye.”

“Does he?” replied I, believing, in my innocence, that such a good-tempered, laughing fellow would scarcely brush a fly from our hackles.

“So you’ll say,” continued my friend, “when you’ve tasted it.”

“But I mean to avoid flogging,” I rejoined, “by obeying orders.”

“Pooh, pooh,” returned Trimbush, testily. “Intentions are good enough; but a fig for orders when the blood’s up! I don’t always obey them myself, old as I am. However, as you haven’t yet viewed a fox, it’s no use my mentioning anything about the field. We shall begin cub-hunting in a few weeks, and then you will get a little insight as to what you are to do there. In the meantime I’ll cut some notches in your memory regarding kennel discipline, and relate a few peculiarities concerning your companions.”

“Thank you,” said I to the friendly offer.

“In the first place I should tell you,” began Trimbush, “that the best step to take at the outset is to endeavour to become a favourite with those in authority over you. This is easily acquired, by doing that which you are told cheerfully, and without the trouble of compulsion being exercised. For it’s one thing to disobey an order when hunting, and quite another in the kennel. We all love our huntsman, Will Sykes; but he is very strict, and never allows a fault to pass without a rate or the thong being applied. When called, walk up to him with your ears thrown back smilingly, and carry your stern high and proudly. Will can’t bear a hound to look like a sneak. Don’t be quarrelsome at feeding time, or indeed at any other; for although family differences will occasionally arise over the meal and broth, never be among the first to cause them. I am far from meaning by this that you are not to maintain your rights; on the contrary, you, like everything that lives, not only possess them, but are bound, in self-defence, to support them. There is as much danger, if not more, in always giving way to the domineering of tyrants as in acting the tyrant yourself; although,” continued Trimbush, with a growl at the reminiscence, “the results proved the same here not more than three seasons since.”

“How was that?” inquired I.

“Why,” replied he, “in all packs there is a master hound, who lords it over the rest just as he pleases. Now it frequently happens that this master becomes a regular bully, and so worries and torments his companions, that there is no living in comfort with him. We had a governor of this kind three years ago, and what do you think we did?”

“Can’t say,” rejoined I.

“Killed and ate him,” returned Trimbush, with no more concern than if speaking of the death of a rabbit.

“Killed and ate him!” repeated I, horrified.

“Ay,” rejoined he, “marrow, bones, and all, with the exception of his head.”[1]

“Dog eat dog!” I exclaimed, scarcely believing the statement to be true.

“It’s not an every-day occurrence,” coolly replied Trimbush; “but what I’ve told ye is by no means a solitary instance, as you shall learn. There was a shy, broken-spirited puppy entered the same season with me, and whenever any of us began a bit of fun with him, he’d shriek and howl ‘pen-an-ink’ just as if he was being murdered. This, of course, led every one to take advantage, and the poor devil never had any peace of mind or body. One day, however, when a few of us had pinned him in a corner of the court, and were baiting him for sport, who should step in but Ned Adams, the second whip. How he paid us off, to be sure! Not one escaped but with every bone in his body aching fit to split.”

“But it served all of you right,” interrupted I.

“Perhaps it did,” rejoined Trimbush; “but we thought otherwise, and no sooner had Ned turned his back than we commenced making a retaliation upon the cur who had caused us such a drubbing. We had scarcely begun, however, when Ned again made his unwelcome appearance, and flogged us until every stroke from his double-thong seemed to soak right through our bodies. Before the cock gave notice of the coming day,” continued Trimbush, significantly, “Tricksy—for that was the name of the hound—was disposed of so as to leave no trace behind.”

“Eaten!” I ejaculated.

“We didn’t leave,” replied my friend deliberately, and dropping his words like peas from his jaws, “even his head.”

“But why was this done?” inquired I.

“The simplicity of infancy is truly refreshing!” observed Trimbush. “There’s an adage, that a dead dog may tell how he was killed,” continued he; “but an eaten one never can. Do you comprehend?”

“Perfectly,” responded I.

“From what I have said,” he resumed, “you must now be aware of the policy of neither being overbearing to your fellows, nor too tame or submissive to them. I am now master here, and this is the rule I both teach and observe.”

“And a very good one too,” I remarked; “but don’t let me interrupt you. Pray proceed.”

“You would find out in time,” resumed Trimbush, “but may as well profit by my experience, and learn it at once, that most men who go with us to the covert-side know little about hunting and less about hounds. So long as their patience is not cramped with drawing blanks, and we go the pace with heads up and sterns down, they are satisfied, and take little further interest in us. Not one in fifty can tell even what the points of a hound are; and as for understanding anything about our habits and dispositions, they think that we are as much alike as cherries upon the same stalk. So far, however, from that being the case, we differ from each other in every respect as much as man to man engaged in the same pursuit, and frequently inherit the peculiarities of our fathers and mothers, as they do. You see that black-and-tan hound basking in the sun?”

“Yes.”

“That’s Valentine. Now, his father, who was killed from a kick three years ago, always trotted to and from kennel just under the huntsman’s off stirrup, and Valentine does precisely the same. There’s Graceful, a bitch in the next court—she invariably is the first home and the last to covert, and her mother did the like before her.”

“That appears to be innate laziness,” I observed.

“No,” replied Trimbush. “So far from that being the case, there never were better working hounds on earth.”

“Then how do you account for it?” inquired I.

“There are many things,” returned Trimbush, with the air of a philosopher, “as clear to our vision as the sunshine at noon, and yet their causes are hid in impenetrable darkness. I cannot,” continued he, “tell why Graceful and Valentine should inherit the eccentricities of their parents, but only see that they do so.”

“Are these the only two instances coming under your observation?” I asked.

“By no means,” replied my companion. “I could recite a dozen others of a similar nature, but I fear they might prove wearisome. You see that badger-pied hound amusing himself by snapping at the flies buzzing about him? Well, he is a nephew of mine, and makes it a rule, as his father did, to carry home whatever part of the varmint that falls to his share, and never eats it, unless there is a great chance of its being dragged away from him, till he gets to the kennel door.”

“Perhaps he wishes to show everybody on the road that he had a hand in the breaking up,” said I.

“I think vanity has something to do with it,” replied my friend; “but if so, he inherits the pride from his sire, just as those peculiarities I have named are inborn in others.”

“I suppose, if these habits descend from parent to child,” I observed, “that vices are also inheritable.”

“Decidedly,” replied Trimbush, beginning to evince symptoms of drowsiness. “Rioting, skirting, babbling, and all such-like faults, are inheritable, and as much so as the defective points in symmetry.”

“It appears to me somewhat harsh, then,” rejoined I, “to punish us for them.”

“That’s a matter,” added Trimbush, “I must leave to be decided between you and Ned Adams;” and then turning upon his side he closed his eyes, and a deep, low snore quickly proclaimed him to be in the land of shadowy dreams.

I found kennel life at first very tedious, and soon began to pine for the farm-house, liberty, and a romp with the shaggy old shepherd’s dog. I became so home-sick at length, that had the opportunity offered, I should have run away; but when taken for exercise, I was always coupled with a companion, and no chance given of an escape from my thraldom. Notwithstanding the kindness of the feeder, in offering me food twice, and occasionally even three times a day, I got thinner and thinner, and instead of the sleek and bright coat which I had upon leaving my walk, my hackles now began to stare and to look little less rough than a badger’s skin. Trimbush, too, essayed to relieve me from my load of misery, and recounted many a tale of interest to wean me from gloomy reflections; but it was all to no purpose. I could not forget the pleasures of home.

“He’ll be right enough in a day or two,” said the huntsman to an expression of regret from the feeder at my altered appearance. “Let him go cub-hunting once, and he will not sulk another hour.”

“I believe ye,” rejoined the feeder. “There’s too good blood in him for that, after he has winded a fox.”

“Well, then,” added the huntsman, “to-morrow at daylight we draw Wiverton Gorse; and if it does not hold a litter, it will be the first time since my servitude—a matter of twenty-five years and more.”