Some hounds cannot run if they carry much flesh; others are all the
better for having plenty about them. The boilers should be of iron, two
in number,--one for meal and the smaller one for flesh. The large boiler
should render it necessary to be used not more than once in four days or
a week. The food should be stirred for two hours, then transferred to
flat coolers, until sufficiently gelatinous to be cut with a kind of
spade. By the admixture of some portion of soups it may be brought to
any thickness requisite. The flesh to be mixed with it should be cut
very small, that the greedy hounds may not be able to obtain more than
their share. Four bushels and a half of genuine old oatmeal should be
boiled with a hundred gallons of water. The flesh should he boiled every
second or third day. Too great a proportion of soup would render the
mixture of a heating nature.
Mr. Delmé Radcliffe very truly observes that the feeding of hounds, as
regards their condition, is one of the most essential proofs of a
huntsman's skill in the management of the kennel. To preserve that even
state of condition throughout the pack which is so desirable, he must be
well acquainted with the appetite of every hound; for some will feed
with a voracity scarcely credible, and others will require every kind of
enticement to induce them to feed.
Mr. Meynell found that the use of dry unboiled oatmeal succeeded better
than any other thing he had tried with delicate hounds. When once
induced to take it, they would eat it greedily, and it seemed to be far
more heartening than most kinds of aliment. Other hounds of delicate
constitution might be tempted with a little additional flesh, and with
the thickest and best of the trough, but they required to be watched,
and often to be coaxed to eat.
The dog possesses the power of struggling against want of food for an
almost incredible period. One of these animals, six years old, was
missing three-and-twenty days; at length some children wandering in a
distant wood thought that they frequently heard the baying of a dog. The
master was told of it, and at the bottom of an old quarry, sixty feet
deep, and the mouth of which he had almost closed by his vain attempts
to escape, the voice of the poor fellow was recognised. With much
difficulty he was extricated, and found in a state of emaciation; his
body cold as ice and his thirst inextinguishable, and he scarcely able
to move. They gave him at intervals small portions of bread soaked in
milk and water. Two days afterwards he was able to follow his master a
short distance.
This occurrence is mentioned by M. Pinguin as a proof that neither
hunger nor thirst could produce rabies. Messrs. Majendie and F. Cousins
have carried their observations to the extent of forty days--a
disgraceful period. [22]
MANAGEMENT OF THE PACK.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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