Gents Mag 1899 part 2 p.551

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	Gentleman's Magazine 1899 part 2 p.551 in a sheep, perhaps, and another a bag of meal. The huntsmen's wages are quickly raised, and the farmers vie in offering to kennel the pack. At some ancient farmhouse a meet is called at the earliest hour there is light enough to see properly. Retiring by day into the most out-of-the-way parts of the mountains, the fell fox is forced to run some distance ere committing his depredations. He makes nightly sorties into the outlying valleys and distant levels, and in his attacks on fowl-houses is even less merciless than his brother of the shires. A single fell fox once raided a goose-hovel, no fewer than sixteen of which were missing when when the place was visited by the owner next morning. Clearly the fox could not have deported this number of birds, and eventually the dead bodies were found buried in the midden, not twenty yards from the hut in which the geese had been kept. Bearing in mind, therefore, Master Reynard's propensity to wander far of nights, the huntsman is early afoot, and attempts to intercept his return. He draws the "lown'd" side of the fell (i.e. that side on which the breeze is least felt) first, and rarely fails in getting a chase, for, as previously noted, the game is numerous. Striking a trail, the hounds race merrily into the fell-heads - Reynard in front, hearing their music, makes forward to gain his home before they can overhaul him, but finds his way baulked by a number of shepherds and their dogs, who have climbed to the earth while it was still dark. He turns to make for another "earth" more distant, but is often rolled over in his stride. As the morning goes on, more and more scents are struck, with the inevitable result that the pack splits up into threes and fours, each bevy hunting for all it is worth with a detachment of the field chasing after it. No fewer than seven foxes have been known to be afoot in the hinterland surrounding Buckbarrow earth at one time, within a radius of half a mile. The "earth-stoppers," it may be remarked, are often disappointed of a view of the hunting after all. I knew one man of over seventy climb from Sacgill (sic) to the top of Buckbarrow before daylight. Arrived there, he stopped all the holes he could find, lit a small fire of peat, and stayed till nightfall, with his two dogs for company. This was on a day when February rain-clouds closed thick about the fells, and his position could only have been one of great discomfort. Meantime the huntsman, in a farmyard half a dozen miles away, was disconsolately wandering about alone, for on the previous day, when the hounds were walking across the mist-piled division between two valleys, the majority of them had bolted on a hot scent, and could not be traced. However, they turned up at the kennels (at Ambleside some ten miles
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	-- Buckbarrow Crag

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