The Daughter of Bugle Ann: An Excerpt
This foxhound classic by a Pulitzer Prize-winning author, reprinted in 2003 by The Derrydale Press, is cloth bound, 153 pages, $18.95, in the Foxhunting Life Shop.Our dogs rustled out a fox, south and east beyond all hearing, running like they were tied to him. It was eleven o’clock at night, middling damp and black-dark, for the young moon had already gone to hide.
We squatted on the west slope of the Divide above Heaven Creek—the usual four of us, armed with boiled eggs and onion sandwiches, and we carried along a water jug, and my father had a half-a-pint of whiskey. Our trucks were under the oaks, just far enough back for firelight to pretend that radiator caps were precious gems. The spooky places among big trees were full of betty-millers and numerous other moths, and beetles were a-buzzing.
But it seemed as if the timberland considered itself incomplete, without voices of hounds splitting themselves upon the shagbarks; and so all life was waiting and summoning—acorn and peeking coon and noxious flytrap weeds beside the creek—urging that the pack return and make dutiful music in the background.
Benjy Davis pulled his thin brown face away from the fire: the blaze was good to watch but hard to sit by. He said to all and sundry, “She’s just about coming in.”
A Christmas Eve Hunt
Joe Bills / Monica Powell photoThis excellent hunting morning started early, as I arose at 5:00 am to check the forecast and discuss it with Carrollton Hounds MFH and huntsman Dulany Noble. Being “the weather guy” in the hunt, I checked radar and several different weather services as sleet had been predicted the night before. The precipitation had been shoved back so we decide to give it a go.
I drove out to the barn to prepare Joe, Jr. for the day’s hunt. Luckily my barn is within hacking distance from the fixture, so I got him ready and tacked up. We went up the driveway, down into the bottom, back up through the neighbor’s and up to Begg Road. We saw a family out walking with a small child and stopped to wish them a Merry Christmas. We paused to give the child her first encounter with a horse. Then on we went up the road. I enjoyed the view from the ridge, looking over the farms of Maryland’s Carroll County and seeing the houses decorated for the season. The skies grew steel grey as the morning progressed, portending the coming precipitation. The air was heavy and winds slight.
The East Galway Foxhounds at Taughmaconnell
Joe Cavanagh, MFH flies a stone wall / Noel Mullins photo
A Dublin-based journalist once wrote that the only way you would find the village of Taughmaconnell in County Roscommon was if you took a wrong turn! But this is far from the truth, and in fairness he later wrote that if one wanted a world free from distraction, then Taughmaconnell was the place!
The Coyote, An “Allegory of Want”
Here is the funniest, most perceptive, and penetrating description of the coyote that I have ever read! Excerpted from “Roughing It,” a collection of Mark Twain’s experiences while traveling through the Wild West by mule wagon between 1861 and 1867. From the Foxhunting Life archives.
Jim Duggan photo
Another night of alternate tranquility and turmoil. But morning came, by and by. It was another glad awakening to fresh breezes, vast expanses of level greensward, bright sunlight, and impressive solitude utterly without human beings or human habitations, and an atmosphere of such amazing properties that trees that seemed close at hand were more than three miles away.
We resumed undress uniform, climbed atop of the flying coach, dangled our legs over the side, shouted occasionally at our frantic mules, merely to see them lay their ears back and scamper faster, tied our hats on to keep our hair from blowing away, and leveled an outlook over the world-wide carpet about us for things new and strange to gaze at. Even at this day it thrills me through and through to think of the life, the gladness, and the wild sense of freedom that used to make the blood dance in my veins on those fine overland mornings!
Along about an hour after breakfast we saw the first prairie-dog villages, the first antelope, and the first wolf. If I remember rightly, this latter was the regular coyote (pronounced ky-o-te) of the farther deserts. And if it was, he was not a pretty creature or respectable either, for I got well acquainted with his race afterward, and can speak with confidence.
The Coyote: An Allegory of “Want”
Jim Duggan photo
Here is the funniest, most perceptive and penetrating description of the coyote that I have ever read! Excerpted from Roughing It, a collection of Mark Twain’s experiences while prospecting and reporting in the Wild West between 1861 and 1867.
Another night of alternate tranquility and turmoil. But morning came, by and by. It was another glad awakening to fresh breezes, vast expanses of level greensward, bright sunlight, and impressive solitude utterly without human beings or human habitations, and an atmosphere of such amazing properties that trees that seemed close at hand were more than three miles away.
We resumed undress uniform, climbed atop of the flying coach, dangled our legs over the side, shouted occasionally at our frantic mules, merely to see them lay their ears back and scamper faster, tied our hats on to keep our hair from blowing away, and leveled an outlook over the world-wide carpet about us for things new and strange to gaze at. Even at this day it thrills me through and through to think of the life, the gladness, and the wild sense of freedom that used to make the blood dance in my veins on those fine overland mornings!
Along about an hour after breakfast we saw the first prairie-dog villages, the first antelope, and the first wolf. If I remember rightly, this latter was the regular coyote (pronounced ky-o-te) of the farther deserts. And if it was, he was not a pretty creature or respectable either, for I got well acquainted with his race afterward, and can speak with confidence.
California Governor Signs Hound Bill
California Governor Jerry Brown has signed into law a bill that bans the use of dogs in hunting bear and bobcat. The moment represents a long-sought for success for animal rights activists, who have been bringing this or similar bills to the California legislature for many years now. Pro-hunting groups with the help of the […]
Ruler’s Message
A thick mist descended upon Red ScreesAs reported by The Westmorland Gazette, April 14, 1900
On Monday the meeting of the Coniston Foxhounds was at Grove farm. Hounds got upon a drag close to the farm and carried it up Martindale Pasture, by Hind Cove, to Troutbeck Hundreds. Here a fox was unkennelled, which went across Woundale Bottoms, crossed the Kirkstone Road, and climbed up Brow End Allotment. Climbing along the top to Woundale Head, he made a sharp turn to the left, and came down behind Kirkstone House. He now crossed the road at the Ullswater side of the Pass, near the Kirk Stones, and scrambled up the sides of Red Screes.
Boxing Day Brings Britain No Closer to Repeal of the Ban
Boxing Day, traditionally the best-attended day of the hunting season in England, will bring large fields and throngs of hunt supporters to the meets, but no solace in their dreams of repealing the despised Hunting Act of 2005. Prime Minister David Cameron’s campaign pledge to bring the matter to a vote in Parliament notwithstanding, such […]
Huntsman in Training
Blue Ridge huntsman Guy Allman’s daughter Olivia on her first field hunter with mom Fran Harding keeping her in the middle. In case you don’t recognize the horn call, Olivia is blowing “Happy New Year!” to all!
Heythrop Pleads Guilty to Unlawful Foxhunting; Judge Rounds on Plaintiff
The Heythrop Hunt, former huntsman Julian Barnfield, and ex-Master Richard Sumner all pleaded guilty to charges of unlawful hunting in Oxford Magistrates’ Court. The charges were brought by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA). The guilty pleas were made after the court was shown film taken by anti-hunt monitors during […]