It was not allowable to take bird-dogs after hares. I say it was not allowable; I do not say it was not done, for sometimes, of course, the pointers _would_ come, and we could not make them go back. But the hare-dogs were the puppies and curs, terriers, watch-dogs, and the nondescript crew which belonged to the negroes, and to the plantation generally. What a pack they were! Thin, undersized black-and-tans, or spotted beasts of doubtful breed, called "houn's" by courtesy; long legged, sleepy watch-dogs from the "quarters," brindled or "yaller" mongrels, which even courtesy could not term other than "kyur dogs"; sharp-voiced "fises," busier than bees, hunting like fury, as if they expected to find rats in every tuft of grass; and, when the hares got up, bouncing and bobbing along, not much bigger than the "molly cottontails" they were after, getting in everyone's way and receiving sticks and stones in profusion, but with their spirits unbroken. And all these were in one incongruous pack, growling, running, barking, ready to steal, fight, or hunt, whichever it happened to be. We used to have hunts on Saturdays, just we boys, with perhaps a black boy or two of our particular cronies; but the great hunt was "in the holidays"--that is, about Christmas. Then all the young darkies about the place were free and ready for sport. This Christmas hunt was an event. II It was the year 186--, and, Christmas-day falling on a Sunday, Saturday was given as the first day of the holidays. It had been a fine Fall; the cover was good, and old hares were plentiful. It had been determined some time before Christmas that we would have a big hare-hunt on that day, and the "boys"--that is, the young darkies--came to the house from the quarters, prepared for the sport, and by the time breakfast was over they were waiting for us around the kitchen door. Breakfast was always late about Christmas time; perhaps, the spareribs and sausages and the jelly dripping through a blanket hung over the legs of an upturned table accounted for it; and on, this Christmas eve it was ten by the tall clock in the corner of the dining-room before we were through. When we came out, the merry darkies were waiting for us, grinning and showing their shining teeth, laughing and shouting and calling the dogs. They were not allowed to have guns; but our guns, long old single-barrels handed down for at least two generations, had been carried out and cleaned, and they were handing them around, inspecting and aiming them with as much pride as if they had been brand-new. There was only one exception to this rule: Uncle "Limpy-Jack," so called because he had one leg shorter than the other, was allowed to have a gun. He was a sort of professional hunter about the place. No lord was ever prouder of a special privilege handed down in his family for generations.