Some people now-a-days advertise their cub-hunting meets, but I think it is a bad plan, because cub-hunting is for the instruction of the young hounds, and the fewer people you have out with you, at any rate during the earlier stages of it, the better. It may, however, save a little trouble in sending round to the landowners and farmers where you are going, and who of course must be informed.

In cub-hunting remember that not only your young hounds have to be trained, but your two and three year old hunters, in which the pack should always be strong, have to be looked after and kept up to their work, which is of the greatest possible importance to the pack.

It is better not to take hounds into thick big woodlands until the undergrowth has fallen a bit. Hounds cannot so well, until it has fallen, force their way through it, the heat chokes them. They get dispirited and exhausted, and in well-rided woods young hounds may take to skirtling.

In cub-hunting rout out your litters well. Let your hounds find their fox themselves, and when they find keep quite quiet. This applies also to the whippers-in. Let them stick to him and let the others go. The more cubs you kill the steadier will your young hounds be, but do not murder a lot of foxes in one place. A brace of well-killed cubs will do your hounds more good than a dozen mopped up ones. It is better to return another day and kill a brace more if it is necessary. It is best always to draw those places where you know there are litters. If cubs go to ground, dig them. It teaches your young hounds to mark them to ground.

In an enclosed country never let them into the open till nearly the end of cub-hunting, because whippers-in cannot get to them readily and they may get into mischief. When you do let them go, if they get on the line of an old fox, do not stop them if you desire to do so, till they get to some natural obstacle, such as a park wall, or throw up of themselves. Stopping them is likely to discourage them.

Teach your hounds to trust to themselves, and when you do assist them do so in such a way that they do not perceive it. It is a pitiful thing to see hounds staring up helplessly at their huntsman the moment they get into difficulties.

You must, of course, encourage hounds, but mind how you do it. With too much encouragement, you may make them speak to anything or nothing at all.