United States or Jersey ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
To capture partridges required unusual cunning and skill, and such importance did the vixen attach to this branch of her field-craft, that, before initiating her youngsters into the sport of hunting these birds at night, she instructed them diligently in the methods of following by scent, training them how to pursue the winding trail left by the larks that fed at evening near their sleeping places, or by the corncrakes that wandered babbling through the green wheat.
To net hares successfully it is necessary to know their habits; and the keeper, having served a lifelong apprenticeship in field-craft, was prepared for every emergency. His object at this time was not to kill the hares, but simply to educate them, to warn them thoroughly once for all against the wiles of their worst enemy, the poacher.
Henceforth, every night, they ventured, under their mother's care, to roam afield, their journeys becoming longer and still longer as their strength increased, till, familiar with the hedgerow paths, they were ready and eager to learn the rudiments of such field-craft as concerned their unpretending lives.
They have always been a pleasure-loving people, certainly, but more inclined to bull-fighting than field-craft, and yet as early as 1600 they must have had a better dog for game-finding than could have been found in any other part of the world.
Word Of The Day