prizingly diſappointed on ſuch occaſions. You have many times been able to hunt the ſame walk in one part of the fields and not in another; you have hunted the ſame walk at ten or eleven, which gave the leaſt ſcent at ſeven in the morning; and, which is moſt provoking and perplexing of all, you have often been able to hunt it only at the wrong end, or backwards: after many hours wonder and expectation, cheriſhing your Dogs, and curſing your fortune, you are in truth never ſo far from your Game as when your hunt is warmeſt. All theſe accidents are only the effect of the hoar-froſt, or very groſs dew, (for they never happen otherwiſe,) and from thence muſt the miracle be accounted for [1].
I have already proved that a thaw tends to corrupt the particles, and have as good
- ↑ "In the winter there is no ſcent early in the morning when there is either an hoar-froſt or a hard froſt; the hoar-froſt, by its force, contracts and contains all the warm particles in itſelf, and the harder froſt congeals them. In theſe caſes, the Dogs with the moſt tender noſes cannot touch before the ſun diſpels them, and the day is advanced; then the Dogs can fmell, and the trail yields a ſcent as it evaporates." Xenophon.
