Despite the difficulties presented by the rough surfaces and the peculiar weather associated with such elevations, fox-hunting is carried on to a large extent among the fells. The natives are sportsmen from their wild environment and the opportunities it gives for the chase. Foxes are too plentiful, their depredations being bewailed by every farmer, shepherd, and poultry-raiser within the area mentioned. The farm hands have comparatively little to do in winter, for the sheep are brought from the distant uplands on the approach of hard weather, and their attention, therefore, only takes up a few hours of each day. As the shepherd seldom, even on the darkest mornings, turns out later than five a.m., it will be readily understood that there is plenty of daylight left for hunting.

Four packs of hounds hunt the Lake Country, and, circumscribed though the area is, there is no difficulty in arranging meets. Appointments seldom clash, for each mountain group has its own foxes and earths, and it is only when they cannot get to earth near home that they rush away over miles of crag and grass, in the usually vain hope of outstripping their pursuers. Many years ago a fox made a circuitous route about the moors at the foot of Kentmere, then ran over into Longsleddale, giving a good forty-five minutes round that valley before the kill. Two packs having joined in the chase, some discussion arose as to which should claim the fox. Two veteran dalesmen were therefore appointed arbitrators, and arrived at a satisfactory decision by selecting the hounds which, in their opinion, had most distinguished themselves in the later stages of the chase.

The hounds most adapted to this class of hunting are big, strong animals; in no pack is uniformity a craze, either in colour or size. Most huntsmen keep a couple of small but exceedingly fast hounds, as they can help the terriers in some of the wider tunnels in the earths, where occasionally a fox will lie at bay on a rock-shelf out of reach of its smaller pursuers. These terriers are very small, hard animals, pugnacious in their excitement but wonderfully docile both before and after. They cannot, of course, pass the rough country at the speed of hounds—barely can they keep up with the humans; therefore the huntsman frequently gives them a lift in his capacious side-pockets. The memories of some of the terriers are phenomenal; only let the pack drive their fox into a particular hole, and its location and interior arrangements are indelibly fixed in the little dogs’ minds.

The life of a fells fox does not present many new features; from birth he has to exert all his marvellous instincts for self-preservation. In spring and summer he lies out for days on the open moors, where the huntsmen dare not come, for fear of injuring the ewes and lambs. All summer Reynard is the scourge of the fells, but when wintry days cover his usual haunts with snow, he is forced to leave for the valleys. ‘Circling round the top of Bowfell were twelve ravens, uttering their hoarse cries, and diving persistently towards some object among the rocks. The safety of their carrion breakfast was at stake, for a prowling fox was evidently the butt at which they were worrying. As we neared the summit, a deep gully on the Langdale side, full of snow and with a considerable cornice at the top, showed where Reynard had escaped his tormentors. The white mantle of snow was covered with the footmarks of the birds, and backwards and forwards along the very edge of the precipice the fox had passed and repassed, evidently afraid to make the plunge. An overhanging rock upon the left, where the snow lay at a severe angle, had given the chance he sought, and he had jumped over, going up to the hips in the fluffy drift beneath.’

By this season the packs are again on the alert, and only occasionally are the foxes given a rest. At a swinging trot the fox gets about a dozen miles from his earth during the night, and, returning at daybreak, finds hounds between him and his strongholds. It is easy work outflanking them, but sooner or later a hum in the rear proclaims that some wanderer has struck his line. Half an hour’s hard racing finds him exhausted—his night’s work has already sapped his strength; then on to the view sweeps the pack. A sharp race forward, a desperate snap at the foremost hound, a momentary check in the parti-coloured stream, a loud, rattling chorus, and bold Reynard’s carcass lies still among the bracken.

The earths whence the red vermin make their journeys, it may be here remarked, might be whole districts from their extent. On Buckbarrow, for instance, standing at the heads of Kentmere, Mardale, and Longsleddale, the ground is tunnelled for the area of almost a square mile, one set of holes communicating with another. The miles of passages generally baffle the ‘cutest of terriers, and the great caverns have heard the death-shriek of many a fighting dog. If hunting is being carried on within the valleys mentioned, the escape of the fox has always to be prevented by blocking the chief entrances to this earth.

The following record of a day’s hunt may show more clearly how the sport is carried on under the circumstances:

As I came round the corner of Kirkstone Fell from Woundale Moss, distinct sounds came from hounds from the side of Red Screes, and a few seconds later my eye was attracted by the huntsman’s red coat crossing the skyline. The pack had therefore started three-quarters of an hour ago; but as there might be a delay before a huntable scent was discovered, I followed at my best pace. Fourteen hundred feet of grassy slack, crag, and scree had to be ascended, to the point where hounds had gone out of sight. In my eagerness, when threading the tortuous way among the crags, I made a wrong turn, leaving the grass benks for a more direct but steeper route. At one point I was climbing a rough ironstone gully, with screes shelving precipitously below, and succeeding this were loose stones. Twenty minutes after leaving the road, however, I passed the caËrn on the summit. Windermere, Coniston, Esthwaite, and Ullswater were all visible as I glanced around for the hounds. A faint bay came up the wind, then another; then straight over Scandale I detected figures moving among the boulders. They were, as the crow flies, about a mile and a half distant, but a deep valley lay between. I was not long in getting down the sixteen hundred feet into the dalehead, and then, for the first time, I saw a number of actively moving white dots among the crags. When within a quarter of a mile, the knot of men, who had not moved far during my approach, struck up the fell, leaving me struggling across the boulders at the foot of the crags. Gradually the yards separating us shrank down; then they turned round a crag-end and I lost view. The horn pealed again and again, and each time there was quite a chorus. Game was obviously afoot, and my first was likely to be my last glimpse of the hunting. In a few moments, however, a single hound came into view against the skyline; then I was standing among an inquisitive, sniffing crowd. The rousing signals which had so disconcerted me were those calling the pack from a hopeless scent. Four men followed, and we were heading leisurely back at a fair elevation above the dale, when one of the leading hounds gave the unmistakable triumphant ‘find,’ and the whole, dogs and men, rushed at top speed over very rough ground. Two hundred and fifty yards further on we recovered the pack around a storm-rent outcrop. Two terriers were slipped into the entrance to this ‘hold,’ and very shortly a series of fierce yaps and yells proclaimed that the tenant was giving fight. Bowman ordered hounds and followers to retire, hoping that the fox would make a dash into the open. Looking down a crack in the crags, our huntsman now espied Reynard, and asked us to help clear a passage. Accordingly, a good many pieces of rock were dislodged; but the venue of battle rapidly moving, our work was useless. At this time one of the terriers came out for fresh air, and was immediately seized. He had been at grips with Reynard. What a moan of delight that little draggled white creature gave as he was released! He instantly dashed into the dark opening and rejoined the fray.

As the minutes passed our force was augmented, till over a dozen men stood on the hillside. Bowman was desirous of digging the fox out, but there were no tools within miles. But wasn’t the rock broken enough to be removed with pick and spade? In a short hour five or six tons of rock had been torn out, and a nine-foot-deep shaft sunk far towards the scene of conflict, where Jack and Nip had driven their fox to the extremity of its habitation. The wind was bitterly cold; on the bleak hillside there was no shelter from its pitiless sweep, and as afternoon wore on its current became charged with moisture. In the excavations matters were more lively than without. Eager, strong hands were passing out huge pieces of rock. The cliff had gradually been undermined some feet, and there was grave possibility of its splintered crest suddenly collapsing. After more tearing up of long narrow slabs of rock, a cavern was found, in which Bowman caught sight of one of his terriers; and he was kneeling over the tunnel, encouraging them, when a portion of the overhanging rock gave way. Every further effort was nullified by a shower of stones. Reluctantly the huntsman gave the word to come out, taking the terriers with us up the hillside. ‘Give it a chance to come out;’ but I detected in his voice that the fox was unlikely to do so. As a last resort, he picked up several boulders, and hurled them down the slope one after the other on to the roof of the fox’s refuge. The first fragment bounced clear of the platform, but under its successor the top of the tunnel crashed in. At its next bound the rock struck the corner round which we had dug, and shattered it.

After another short wait we returned to our shaft, but found that another long toil was before us if we were to force the fox into the open. It was now quite certain that he would not do this till positively compelled.

‘Let’s hae t’ terriers in agen, an’ he’ll happen stir.‘

The splintering blow which had wrecked our work had apparently made no difference inside the earth, and Reynard was inaccessible as ever. There was nothing but to leave him in possession. But what had he suffered whilst our terriers beat him from pillar to post?

After this termination of the siege, the hounds went over the fell to Kirkstone, I following the valley to Ambleside, and so home. We had had four and a half hours’ work among the rocks, but could not claim a kill.

Such a day of disappointment is occasionally inevitable, but the hunting more often suffers from the excess of events. When foxes returning from their night’s prowl are converging on the main earths, it becomes a question, with so many afoot, which to follow first. The difficulty of keeping a pack together where scents are crossing here, there, and everywhere is very great. Often at the end of the day hounds are hunting in groups of four or five, each portion being followed by a section of ‘the field.’

For hunting we prefer the spring to autumn, as in the former period the ground is less liable to be sodden, and the mists are seldom so thick and persistent. Of course, deep snowdrifts are often lying in the northerly ghylls, and near these the going is heavy and unpleasant. We met at Sacgill, a picturesque cluster of old farmhouses at the head of Longsleddale. It was not yet daylight; stars glinted above in the clear, cold sky; a silvery crescent hung in the west; all round the dark hills sheered up skywards. Though the hour was so early, the people were up and doing the necessary day’s duties by lantern light. As the first gray streaks of dawn rose in the east, the shepherd sallied out into the intakes to his flock, and the idlers adjourned to the temporary kennels. In a few minutes the door was opened and the hounds skeltered into the daylight, making the dalehead ring as the huntsman gave his preliminary wind of the horn. Then the shepherd came down the intake, and, as he got near enough, shouted that there was a big fox coming round the end of Dixon Crag—a mile and a half off as the crow flies. Having got so near home, it was more than likely that the redskin would risk all on his outpacing the hounds in the four miles to Buckbarrow. We toiled up a long ascent, near the top of which hounds struck a scent, and a wild crash of music proclaimed it red-hot. My old friend faced the slope no longer, but ran along it with a long, shambling stride.

‘By gum!’ he panted, when I got up to him, ‘t’ ahld divvil’ll be in affor t’ hooals er blockt’ (the old devil will be in before the holes are blocked).

My attention had perforce to be confined to the ground we were crossing. It was like the dÉbris of some huge cathedral piled block on block, and overgrown with parsley fern—so rough that in cooler moments I would have looked to avoid crossing it. A big ghyll furrowed the side of the fell, and away near the skyline the pack were pouring into it, and in a few moments climbing out on the further side. We had to cross the stream. The slope behind us made it difficult to leap, and the only hold beyond was on a slippery spur of rock. When we reached the hillside again the hounds were but a memory. Among dead bracken and across scree we ploughed determinedly, and in a few minutes reached a corner of the fell from which we caught a distant glimpse of the hounds in full cry. The huntsman was waiting here, and the whips. My companion, however, told me that the fox was now going to some ‘stopped’ holes, and would doubtless return quite close to hand.

After a seemingly interminable wait, a draggled fox, with back up, darted round a corner of the hill in front, and crossed the brook. A terrier was let loose. For a moment Reynard hesitated, then galloped forward; but the pugnacious animal was on him, worrying and snapping. The fox turned to his tormentor, but in a few seconds a loud chorus from the pack, which had been at fault, maybe, a moment, proclaimed the ‘view.’ The hounds seemed to shoot over every obstacle, and a turmoil of black-and-tan and liver-and-white, showed the death. The brush was rescued, but the head had been crushed out of all semblance by some iron jaw.

The next move was into a valley-head, where at every step a muddy fountain spurted over our boots from the spongy moss. From the east a dense white mist had been creeping over the mountains, completely hiding everything not close at hand. We heard, rather than saw, hounds pick up another trail, and soon the rousing calls of the hunt died away. The dalesmen with our party plodded along—tireless hunters they are—in the direction of the dying sounds. We were struggling along a rock-strewn gully, when the hounds again came faintly within hearing. There was an immediate rush across the craggy hillside; then the unmistakable sound pealed from below, its sharpness intensified by the mists around. At the foot of the rocky slope we ran into clear air, and saw the hounds lacing along an uneven grass plateau. In a few minutes their quest apparently decided to take refuge on higher ground, so the pack again dashed out of view in the fog-banks. We had been moving in so many different directions that I had long since lost every sense of locality, and was forced to follow the others. The huntsman said the hounds would be found again when the mist blew up. The wind had been freshening all the morning, and was now hurling the unwieldy folds of mist forward; hill-tops rose boldly through the whirl, then were hidden as the next wave of cloud came along. Gradually, however, the veil dissipated, and the familiarity of the opening view struck me. When the last rag of vapour rolled from beneath, I saw Sacgill and the head of Longsleddale at our feet—we were standing near the grassy slope from which our hounds had chased their first fox. Again and again the huntsman sounded his horn; the hounds would make answer if they heard. Then we made back into Goat Scaur—a grand line of precipices near Buckbarrow—hoping to get a few together as we did so. The whip ultimately issued from a glen in Gray Crag as we came opposite. He had turned back with about half a dozen hounds after running a fox into an impregnable heap of boulders. In a while we heard another call—a trio of shepherds before whom five hounds had driven a fox round Branstree and into the Gatescarth, where they lost the scent. When a fair number of hounds and men had rallied, a visit was made to a benk where an old stager was in the habit of lying.

I had had enough of racing over sloppy grass and rough boulders, so stayed with another to watch for any stray hounds, which we were to take down the head to Sacgill. The horn echoed among the hills for awhile, gradually becoming fainter; then came a babel of distant sound and a speedy silence. Something that could run had turned up. In about an hour we had nearly a dozen hounds lying or sitting round us. ‘It would be grand to have a hunt,’ repeated my friend as he reviewed the dirty canines. ‘Hark! holloa! ther’s summat cummen across t’ pass yed!’ It was a fox, and apparently in a desperate hurry. 'Git t’ dogs tagither.’ The redskin was within five hundred yards before he became aware of any presence; then he pointed to go round us. ‘He’s followed, he’s followed! Hurray! yon’s Cumrade—Cu-um-ra-ade!’ Our tiny pack had not yet seen the fox, but they were all excitement. Then Reynard, in diving down a slack, revealed his lean body, and hell for leather they pelted over grass and scree, through narrow ravines and over tiny cliffs, up, down, and across becks, we following for all we were worth. The fox was now over the skyline, and we recovered our hounds as they were getting on to the trail. A bay from behind: Comrade still had it, and he—the stoutest dog in the pack—showed the way. In a moment our dogs were tearing along for very life or death. Again we put our best foot foremost, but became finally at fault near a small waterfall. The shepherd sat down to eat the meagre lunch in his pocket, for, said he, ‘they’ll not go far away, I’ll warrant.’ After our meal we made to the nearest hill-top. We reached the summit about two p.m., and immediately my friend found a clue—we overlooked a basin, in which was also a good deal of crag and stony ground. ‘Buckbarrow earth,’ said my companion; ‘and yonder’s old Fishwick.’ I followed the direction, and saw a tiny column of smoke rising from behind a crag. Yes, Fishwick had seen the hounds, and they were in Goat Scaur now. ‘Jack, git ower to Nan Bield; they’ll come that way oot.’

To Nan Bield was a good hour’s walk, and we stood near the caËrn till the sun prepared to sink behind Coniston Old Man. The shepherd grew impatient. Perhaps the hounds had killed, or had turned down the valley. My friend was stamping about among the snow to get a little warmth, when he espied a fox moving over the hills towards High Street. ‘That beggar’s black-wet! Whar’s t’ hoonds?’ In a few minutes we heard the hounds coming along, but on the wrong side of the hill. The shepherd cursed sonorously; our hounds had left the trail of the fox they had chased so far and bravely to respond to their huntsman’s call, for he was also coming at a fair rate in the same direction. To tell how the new fox led us a dance round the head of Kentmere, how it paused on the very crest of High Street, and looked and longed for Swarthfell, then turned down the scree of Nanny Gap and made for Hill Bell, would be a long story. I shall ever remember that blind, blundering rush down the scree, when the loose dÉbris rattled behind us. But the climax was reached soon after that. After negotiating some steep pieces of rock, the fox crossed the summit and dodged his followers. In a few seconds we saw him crossing a shoulder of the hill deep below. Down the scree dashed the hounds and one or two men whose blood was too hot for caution, and as we reached the bottom we found our fox had turned for the huge terraces of Rainsbarrow Crag.

His next move completely surprised us, for, instead of trying to get either above or below the cliffs, he took a line across the most dangerous portion. He had been viewed by the hounds, and they would follow to the end now. The snow lay deep and wind-plastered on every ledge and choked up every crevice. Comrade and Rattler in the van dashed after the fox; we followed, but the going was too dangerous. A few traversed a long series of ledges, kicking off the caked snow and ice; but it was slow work, and the hounds were far ahead. Accordingly, we turned back till quite clear of the cliff, then climbed to the summit. Fox and hounds were still darting about among the rocks, leaping and running hard where a man could scarce have crawled. One hound slipped, and its body was picked up two hundred feet below; another had to be rescued with a rope, having got jammed behind a rock splinter. The sun set before we reached the top of the Yoke, but we managed to get a peep in the fast-waning light of hounds lusting for blood tearing across the bottom to Crag Quarter. Weary with our exertions, we yet mustered a run down. As we came among the rocks again, the huntsman’s horn was winding away on our left. Hounds had killed in the meadows in front of Kentmere Hall. Dearly would we have liked to see the final scene, when the fox which had made so unique a run had come to his end. Hounds were collected at Brockstones—in all, one-third of the number which had left the kennels in the morning—then we made up the slack for Sacgill. With a pack of tired dogs and not less tired men, our progress was slow; but we were in good spirits—the hounds gave tongue as gleefully as ever, and everyone satisfied himself with the remembrance that he had played a part in the run of many seasons.

There are other chases on record which have continued many hours—one, indeed, which lasted through a long winter’s night. Hounds struck the trail of this giant fox just as day was dying, and could not be whipped off when time for ‘kennels’ came; therefore the members of the hunt were forced to go home without the pack, which had long since disappeared into the thickening gloom. At intervals throughout the night shepherds occupying isolated fell-head houses were aroused by the chorus of hounds across the silent wastes. Once the hounds dashed past the farm where their disconsolate huntsman was sitting up; he had steadily refused to go to bed without some news of their welfare. As he rushed into the starlight, the leading bunch came right through the fold (farmyard), and he followed them as fast as his strength permitted. Then he sat down to recover his breath on a boulder in the narrowing glen, and listened to the occasional sounds ringing down the crags and screes. At daybreak a tired fox, followed by a few spent yet determined hounds, struggled across the head of a far-off dale, and were lost to view again among the fells. Whether old CÆsar escaped or died game will never be known. If it were not for admiration of his grim, relentless pursuers, we could wish this plucky fox a longer life.

Collecting the pack after such a run would be exceedingly difficult were it not that hounds, when benighted, always make for the nearest lights. Many a time the dales farmer is called from bed in the small hours by the baying of a stray hound outside his door. He may not previously have been aware that hunting has been afoot in his vicinity, but the animals, as long as they are able, struggle down in full confidence of a warm welcome.

Quite recently the Ullswater pack had a tremendous run. During the day they routed a fox out of a rocky ghyll on St. Sunday’s Crag. It immediately made over Fairfield, and, chased hard, turned to Helvellyn. Here it temporarily baffled the hounds, and turned again along the side of the mountain to Fairfield. The pack were now keeping it so actively employed that it could not get to earth, and had to run over Red Screes, passing the Kirkstone road near its summit. There were only three hounds in the pursuit now, and one of these but a young one. Away over Kirkstone Fell and John Bell’s Banner, across the rough Stony Cove and up High Street, the unattended chase went on. At the summit of the last-named fell the young hound had to confess defeat, but the other two kept up the pace, and finally killed their fox in Mardalehead. I am sorry that the exact mileage and total altitude cannot be established from the data to hand.

There is a very distinct element of danger in fox-hunting on the fells: a slip in crossing the screes at speed may mean a severe dislocation, and is almost certain to result in contusions of a more or less serious character, whilst a fall from any one of the crags crossed in a day’s hunting is certain death. Many years ago a run was proceeding along the narrow ridge of Striding Edge just where it leaves the bulk of Helvellyn. Just as a particularly precipitous point was reached, one Dixon missed his footing and fell many yards. He was picked up quite dead. Still further into the past—about the middle of the eighteenth century—there occurred another accident, this time luckily not fatal. Hounds were slowly puzzling their way across the weatherworn face of Blea Water Crag in pursuit of a fox they had driven out of Mardalehead. By descending one or other of the steep ghylls, the more venturesome of the followers hoped to observe the hounds at work, and possibly head off the fox. Dixon (a common family name in the dales) essayed down a very crumbly watercourse, but lost his footing. Down he came with an awful smash, his body rolling and bounding down the rocks to a great depth, finally wedging itself into a corner of a ledge. Dixon never lost consciousness of his position, nor interest in the sport on hand, for, seeing the fox escaping out of a gully towards High Street, he called out to his comrades above:

‘It’s cummen oot be t’ heigh end! Lig t’ dogs on, lads!’ (It’s coming out by the high end! Lay the dogs on, lads!)

Often the hunt gets into risky places. A little while ago, at the break-up of a frost, there was a considerable rock-slip on Helm Crag, in the Grasmere Valley. Among the dÉbris a fox made its home, and its depredations soon made it the terror of the countryside. When hounds next met in the valley, the huntsman was directed into the redskin’s haunts, and a rare run ensued. Leaving the meadows, the scent lay up the intakes and into the screes beneath the great cliffs. It was soon apparent that hounds had no chance of overhauling the fox—he had had too long a start—but the hunt was pressed, in the hope that he might be turned out of home at length by a terrier. The pack finally stopped by a big heap of boulders, which it was difficult for a man to get near; the recent slip had made the rock around so loose that at any moment hundreds of tons might hurl themselves down the hillside. Nothing deterred by the danger, the huntsman coolly scrambled into Reynard’s fortress with his terrier. Small pieces of crag kept rolling down as the scree beneath was loosened by the approach of the man, and his position at length became untenable. Lancaster did not retreat, however, till quite sure that his terrier could not drive the fox from his tunnel home.