176 The words in brackets have been omitted in our MS. but are in the Shirley MS. and G. de F. p. 129; they have been thus inserted to complete the sense.
177 See Appendix: Excrements.
After I shall teach you to know a great hart by the fumes of the hart, for sometimes they crotey in wreaths, and sometimes flat and sometimes formed, and sometimes sharp at both ends, and sometimes pressed together, and sometime in many other manners as I have said before. When they crotey flat and it be in April or in May or in June if the croteyes be great and thick it is a token that it is a hart chaceable, and if he find the fumes wreathed, and it be from the middle of June to the middle of August in great forms and in great wreaths and well soft, it is a token that it is a hart chaceable, and if he find the fumes that are formed and not holding together as it is from the beginning of July into the end of August, if they are great and black and long and are not sharp at the ends, and are heavy and dry without slime, it is a token that it is a hart chaceable. And if the fumes are faint and light and full of slime, or sharp at both ends, or at one end, these are the tokens that he is no deer chaceable. But if it be when they burnish that they crotey their fumes more burnt and more sharp at the one end, but anon when they have burnished, they crotey their fumes as before, and for that the fumes be good and great; if they be slimy it is a token that he has suffered some disease. From the end of August forward, the fumes are of no judgment for they undo themselves for the rut.
HOW A GREAT HART IS TO BE KNOWN BY HIS "FUMES" (EXCREMENTS)
(From MS. f. fr. 616, Bib. Nat., Paris)
Furthermore ye should know a great hart by the fraying (for if ye find where the hart hath frayed),178 and see that the wood is great where he hath frayed, and he hath not bent it, and the tree is frayed well high, and he hath frayed the bark away, and broken the branches and wreathed them a good height, and if the branches are of a good size, it is a sign that he is a great hart and that he should bear a high head and well troched, for by the troching179 he breaketh such high the boughs that he cannot fold them under him. For if the fraying were bare and he had frayed the boughs under him, it is no token that it be a great hart, and especially if the trees where he had frayed were small. Nevertheless men have seen some great deer fray sometimes to a little tree, but not commonly, but a young deer shall ever more180 fray to a great tree, and therefore should ye look at several frayings. And if ye see the aforesaid tokens oftener upon the great trees than upon the small ye may deem him a great hart. And if the frayings be continually in small trees and low, he is not chaceable and should be refused. Also ye may know a great hart by his lairs. When a great hart shall come in the morning from his pasture, he shall go to his lair and then a great while after he shall rise and go elsewhere there where he would abide all the day. Then when ye shall rise and come to the lair there where the hart hath lain and rested, if ye see it great and broad and well trodden and the grass well pressed down, and at the rising when he passeth out of his lair, if ye see that the foot and the knees have well thrust down the earth and pressed the grass down it is a token that it is a great deer and a heavy (one). And if at the rising he make no such tokens, because that he hath been there but a little while, so that his lair be long and broad ye may deem him a hart chaceable. Also ye may know a great hart by the bearing of the wood, for when a great hart hath a high head and a large (one) and goeth through a thick wood, he findeth the young wood and tender boughs, his head is harder than the wood, then he breaketh the wood aside and mingleth the boughs one upon the other, for he beareth them and putteth them otherwise than they were wont to be by their own kind. And when the glades of the woods are high and broad then he may deem him a great hart, for if he had not a high head and wide he could not make his ways high and large. If it happen so that ye find such glades and have no lymer with you, if ye will know at what time this glade was made, ye must set your visage in the middle of this glade, and keep your breath, in the best wise that ye may, and if ye find that the spider hath made her web in the middle of them, it is a token that it is of no good time181 or at the least it is of the middle (of the noon) of the day before. Nevertheless ye should fetch your lymer for so ye should know better. Also ye may know a great hart by the steps that in England is called trace. And that is called stepping,182 when he steppeth in a place where the grass is well thick, so that the man may not see therein the form of the foot, or when he steppeth in other places, where no grass is but dust or sand and hard country, where fallen leaves or other things hinder to see the form of the foot. And when the hart steppeth upon the grass and ye cannot see the stepping with your eyes, then ye shall put your hand in the form of the foot that hunters call the trace, and if ye see that the form of the foot be of four fingers of breadth, ye may judge that it is a great hart by the trace. And if the sole of the foot be of three fingers' breadth ye may judge him a hart of ten, and if ye see that he hath well broken the earth and trodden well the grass, it is a token that it is a great hart and a heavy deer. And if ye cannot well see it for the hardness of the earth, or for the dust, then ye must stoop down for to take away the dust and blow it away from the form of the foot until the time that ye may clearly see the form that is called the trace. And if ye cannot see it in one place, ye should follow the trace until the time that ye can well see it at your ease. And if ye can see none in any place, ye should put your hand in the form of the foot, for then ye shall find how the earth is broke with the cleeves of the foot on either side, and then ye can judge it for a great hart or a hart chaceable, as I have said before by the treading of the grass; and if leaves or other things be within the form that ye may not see at your ease, ye should take away the leaves all softly or the other things with your hands, so that ye undo not the form of the foot and blow within and do the other things as I have before said.183 (After I will tell you how a man shall speak among good hunters of the office of venery.) First he shall speak but a little, and boast little, and well (work184) and subtlely, and he must be wise and do his craft busily, for a hunter should not be a herald of his craft. And if it happen that he be among good hunters that speaketh of hunting he should speak in this manner. First if men ask him of pastures he may answer as of harts and for all other deer, sweet pastures, and of all biting beasts as of wild boar, wolves, and other biting beasts he may answer, they feed, as I have said before. And if men speak of the fumes ye shall call fumes of a hart, croteying of a buck, and of a roebuck in the same wise of a wild boar and of black beasts and of wolves ye shall call it lesses, and of hare and of conies ye shall say they crotey, of the fox wagging, of the grey the wardrobe, and of other stinking beasts they shall call it drit, and that of the otter he shall call sprainting as before is said. And if men asketh of the beasts' feet, of the harts ye shall say the trace of a hart and also of a buck, and that of the wild boar and of the wolf also they call traces beyond the sea. And that of the stinking beasts that men call vermin, he shall call them steps as I have said. And if he hath seen a hart with his eyes, there are three kinds of hues of them, that one is called brown, the other yellow, and the third dun, and so he may call them as he thinketh that they beareth all their hues. And if men ask what head beareth the hart he hath seen, he shall always answer by even and not by odd, for if he be forked on the right side, and lack not of his rights185 beneath, and on the right186 side antler and royal and surroyal and not forked but only the beam, he shall say it is a hart of ten at default,187 for it is always called even of the greater number. And every buck's tines should be reckoned as soon as a man can hang a baldric or a leash188 thereupon and not otherwise. And when a hart beareth as many tines on the one side as on the other, he may say if he be but forked that he is a hart of ten, and if he be troched of three he is a hart of twelve, if he be troched of four he is a hart of sixteen, always if it be seen that he hath his rights beneath as before is said. And if he lack any of his rights beneath he must abate so many on the top, for a hart's head should begin to be described from the mule189 upwards, and if he hath more by two on the one side than on the other, you must take from the one and count up that other withal, as I shall more clearly speak in a chapter hereafter in describing a hart's head. And if it be so that the hart's trace have other tokens than I have said and he thinks him a hart chaceable, and men ask what hart it is he may say it is a hart of ten and no more. And if it seem to him a great hart and men ask what hart it is, he shall say it is a hart that the last year was of ten and should not be refused. And if he happen to have well seen him with his eye or the before said tokens, so that he knoweth fully that it is as great a hart as a hart may be, if men ask him what hart it is, he may say it is a great hart and an old deer. And that is the greatest word that he may say as I have said before. And if men ask him whereby he knoweth it, he may say for, he hath good bones190 and a good talon and a good sole of foot, for these four191 things makes the trace great, or by fair lairs or the grass or the earth well pressed or by the high head,192 or by the fumes or else other tokens as I have said before. And if he see a hart that hath a well affeted (fashioned) head after the height and the shape and the tines well ranged by good measure, the one from the other, and men ask him what he beareth he may answer that he beareth a great head and fair of beam, and of all his rights, and well opened; and if a man ask him what head he beareth, he shall answer that he beareth a fair head by all tokens and well grown. And if he see a hart that hath a low head or a high, or a great, or a small, and it be thick set, high and low and men ask him what head he beareth he may answer he bears a thick set head after his making, or that he hath low or small or other manner whatever it be. And if he see a hart that hath a diverse head, or that antlers grow back or that the head hath double beams or other diversities than other harts commonly be wont to bear, and men ask what head he bears, he may answer a diverse head or a counterfeit (abnormal), for it is counterfeited. And if he see a hart that beareth a high head that is wide and thin tined with long beams, if men ask what head he beareth, he shall answer a fair head and wide, and long beams, but it is not thick set neither well affeted. And if he see a hart that hath a low and a great and a thick set (head) and men ask what head he beareth, he may say he beareth a fair head and well affeted. And if men ask him by the head whereby he knoweth that it is a great hart and an old, he may answer, that the tokens of the great hart are by the head, and so the first knowledge is when he hath great beams all about as if they were set as it were with small stones, and the mules nigh the head and the antlers, the which are the first tines, be great and long and close to the mule and well apperyng (pearled) and the royals which are the second tines, be nigh the antlers, and of such form, save that they should not be so great; and all the other tines great and long and well set, and well ranged and the troching as I have said before, high and great, and all the beams all along both great and stony, as if they were full of gravel, and that all along the beams there be small vales that men call gutters, then he may say that he knows it is a great hart by the head.
178 The words in brackets are omitted in our MS. but are in the Shirley MS. and in G. de F. p. 132.
179 The tines at top. See Appendix: Antler.
180 Ever more is here a mistake; it should be never more. G. de F. says: "Mes jeune cerf ne froyera jà en gros arbre" (p. 132). Also in the Shirley MS.
181 Not of "good time" means in the old sporting vocabulary an old track, not a recent one.
182 G. de F. calls the track of deer on grass "foulées," from which the modern "foil," "stepping on grass," is derived.
183 A whole line is missing here in our MS. The words in brackets are taken from the Shirley MS. It runs: "Affter I wal telle yowe a man howe he shal speke amonge good hunters of y offyce of venerye."
184 The word "work" has been omitted. "Et bien ouvrer subtilement" (G. de F. p. 134).
185 Brow, bay, and tray tines. See Appendix: Antler.
186 In Shirley MS. it is "left."
187 Instead of this original passage G. de F. says: "For if he had on one side ten points and on the other only one, it should be called summed of twenty" (p. 135).
188 G. de F. has "spur" instead.
189 Burr, mule, from the Fr. meule.
190 Dew claws.
191 According to Shirley MS. and the sense, the "iiii" should be omitted.
192 G. de F. (p. 136) says: "Ou belles portées"—portées being the branches, and twigs broken or bent asunder by the head of the deer, termed "entry" or "rack" in mod. Eng.—Stuart, vol. ii. 551.
After I will tell you how ye should know a great wild boar, and for to know how to speak of it among hunters of beyond the sea. And if a man see a wild boar the which seemeth to him great enough, as men say of the hart chaceable of ten, he shall say a wild boar of the third year that is without refusal, and whenever they be not of three years men call them swine of the sounder, and if he see the great tokens that I shall rehearse hereafter he may say that he is a great boar. Of the season and nature of boar and of other beasts, I have spoken here before. And if men ask him of a boar's feeding, it is properly called of acorns of oak's bearing, and of beechmast, the other feeding is called worming and rooting of the roots out of the earth that feed him. The other kind of feeding is of corn and of other things that come up out of the land, and of flowers and of other herbs; the other kind of feeding is when they make great pits, and go to seek the root of ferns and of spurge within the earth. And if men ask whereby he knoweth a great boar, he shall answer that he knoweth him by the traces and by his den, and by the soil (wallowing pool). And if men ask whereby he knoweth a great boar from a young, and the boar from the sow, he shall answer that a great boar should have long traces and the clees round in front, and broad soles of the feet and a good talon, and long bones, and when he steppeth it goeth into the earth deep and maketh great holes and large, and long the one from the other, for commonly a man shall not see the traces of a boar without seeing also the traces of the bones, and so shall he not of the hart, for a man shall see many times by the foot, that which he will not see by the ergots, but so shall he not see of the boar. What I call the bones of the boar, of the hart I call the ergots, and the cause that a man shall not know as well by the ergots of the hart as by bones of the boar is this, for the bones of the boar are nearer the talon than those of a hart are, and also they are longer, and greater and sharper in front. And therefore as soon as the form of the traces of his foot is in the earth, the form of the bones is there also, and commonly a great boar maketh a longer trace with one of his claws than with the other in front or behind, and sometimes both. And when a man seeth the tokens beforesaid greater, he may deem him greater, and the smaller the trace, the smaller the boar. The sow from the boar ye may know well, for the sow maketh not so good a talon as a right young boar doth. And also a sow's claws are longer and sharper in front than a young boar's. And also her traces are more open in front and straighter behind, and the sole of the foot is not so large as of a young boar, and her bones are not so large nor so long, nor so far the one from the other as those of a young boar, nor go not so deep in the earth, for they be small, and sharp and short, and nearer the one to the other, than a young boar's. And these are the tokens by the which men know a young boar so that he be two year old from all sows, by the trace, for that say I not of the young boars of sounder. And if men ask him how he shall know a great boar by his den, he may answer that if the den of the boar be long and deep and broad, it is a token that it is a great boar so that the den be newly made and that he hath lain therein but once. And if the boar's den is deep without litter, and if the boar lie near the earth it is a token that it is no193 fat boar. And if men ask him how he knoweth a great boar by the soil, then may he answer that commonly when a boar goeth to soil in the coming in or in the going out, men may know by the trace, and so it may be deemed as I have said by his wallowing in the soil. Nevertheless some time he turneth himself from the one side upon the other, and up and down, but a man shall evermore know the form of his body. Also sometimes when the boar parteth from the soil, he rubbeth against a tree, and there a man may know his greatness and his height. And some time he rubs his snout and his head higher than he is, but a man may well perceive which is of the chine and which is of the head. For by his lesses, that is to say what goes from him behind, nor by other judgment a man cannot know a great boar unless he see him, save that he maketh great lesses, and that is a token that he hath a great bowel, and that he be a great boar, and also by the tusks when he is dead, for when the tusks of a boar be great as of half a cubit or more and be both great and large of two fingers or more and there be small gutters along both above and beneath, these be the tokens that he is a great boar and old, and of a smaller boar the judgment is less. And also when the tusks be low and worn, by the nether tusks it is a token of a great boar.
193 G. de F. (p. 139) says if "le senglier gise près de la terre, c'est signe qu'il ait bonne venoison," so our MS. is evidently wrong when it says "it is a token that it is no fat boar."
When the king or my lord the Prince or any of their blood will hunt for the hart by strength, the Master of the Game must forewarn on the previous evening the sergeant of the office, and the yeomen berners at horse, and also the lymerer.194 And then he must ordain which of them three shall go for to harbour the hart, and with them the lymerer for the morrow, and charge the foresters, or if it be in a park, the parkers to attend to him busily. And all the four must accord where the meeting shall be on the morrow, and he must charge the sergeant and one of the two yeomen, if the sergeant be not there, to warn all the yeomen and grooms of the office to be at the meeting at sunrise. And that the yeomen berners on foot and the grooms that are called Chacechiens bring with them the hart hounds and this done ask for the wine, and let them go after. And he that is charged to harbour the hart must accord with the forester of the bailie in which they seek him where they should meet in the grey dawning. Nevertheless it were good readiness to look if they might see any deer at its meating (feeding) the previous evening to know the more readily where to seek and harbour him on the morrow. And on the morrow when they meet the forester that well ought to know of his great deer's haunts, he shall lead the hunter and the lymerer thither, where he best hopes to see him or find of him without noise. And if they can see him and they be in the wind they ought to withdraw from him in the softest manner they can, for dread of frightening him out of his haunt, and then go privily till they be under the wind. And as he stereth (stalks) and paceth forth feeding, they are to draw nigh him as readily and warily as they can so that the deer find them not. And when he has entered his covert, and to his ligging, they ought to tarry till they know that he be entered two skilful bowshots from thence. And then ought the lymerer by bidding of the hunter to cast round with his lymer the quarter that the deer is in, if it be in a huge covert, and if it be in a little covert that the deer is in, set195 all the covert to know whether he is gone away or abides there still. And if he abides, then shall the lymerer go there where the hart went in, and take the scantilon (measure) of the trace for which he should cut off the end of his rod, and lay it in the talon of the trace, there where he went in hardest ground, in the bottom thereof, so that the scantilon will scarcely touch at either end. And that done he should break a bough of green leaves and lay it there where the hart went in, and cut another scantilon thereafter to take to the hunter that he may take it to the lord or to the Master of the Game at the meeting which some men call Assembly. But on the other side, if it be so that they cannot see him as before is said, the forester ought to bring him where most defoil is (tracks) of great male deer within his bailiewick, and there where the best haunt is, and most likely for a hart. And when the harbourer and the lymerer be there, the lymer if he crosses the fues of a deer he will anon challenge it, and then shall the lymerer take heed to his feet to know by the trace what deer it is that the lymer findeth, and if he finds thereby that it is no hart he shall take up his hound and say to him softly, not loud, "Ware rascal, ware!" And if it be of a hart that the lymer findeth, and that it be new he ought to sue (hunt up) with as little noise as he can contreongle (hunting heel) to undo all his moving196 till he find his fumes (excrements), which he ought to put in the great end of his horn, and stop it with grass to prevent them falling out and reward his hound a little. And that done come again there where he began to sue and sue forth the right line till he comes to the entering of the quarter where he thinks that the hart is in. And always with little noise and cast round the quarters, if it be in a great covert as I said before. And also if it be in a little covert, to do of the scantilon and of all other things right as I have said before. And if he be voided (gone) to another quarter or wood, and there be any other covert near always to sue forth and cast round quarter by quarter, and wood by wood till he be readily harboured. And when he is harboured of the scantilon and of all other things do as before is said, and then draw fast to the meeting that men call assembly. And it is to be known that oftentimes a deer is harboured by sight of man's eye, but who should do it well it behoves him to be a skilful and wise hunter. Nevertheless to teach hunters the more readily to seek and harbour a hart according to the country that he is in, I have devised it in certain chapters as ye may hereafter hear.
194 The man who leads the hound in leash when harbouring the hart.
195 To set the covert was for the huntsman or limerer with his hound on a leash to go round the covert that he had seen the deer enter, and to look carefully whether he could find any signs of the stag having left the place. This in more modern parlance is called making his ring walks.
196 Moving, moves. See Appendix: Move.
Afterwards I shall show you how a man should go in quest for the hart with his lymer or by himself. This word quest for the hart is a term of hunters beyond the sea, and means when a man goeth to find a deer and to harbour him, and it is a fair term and shorter said than our term of England to my seeming. And then shall the groom quest in the country that shall be devised to him the night before, and he shall rise in the dawning, and then he must go to the meating (pasturing) of the deer to look if he may see anything to his liking, and leave his lymer in a certain place where he may not alarm them. And thence he should go to the newly hewn wood of the forest or other places where he hopes best to see a hart, and keep always from coming into the wind of the hart, he should also climb upon a tree so that the hart shall wind nothing of him, and that he can see him further. And if he sees a hart standing stably he must look well in what country he shall go to his lair, and privily repair to some place where he can best see
HOW THE HUNTER SHOULD VIEW THE HART
(From MS. f. fr. 616, Bib. Nat., Paris)
him and there break a bough for a mark. But he must remain a great while after, for some time a hart will stall and look about a great while before he will go to his lair, and specially when a great dew is falling, or else sometimes he cometh out again to look about, and to listen and to dry himself, and therefore he should stay long, so as not to frighten him. Then he should fetch his lymer and cast round as it is before said in the chapter of the harbouring of a hart, and take care that neither he nor his hounds make but little noise for dread lest he void.
Also a man may go in quest in the fields in corn, in vines, in gardens, and in other places, where the harts go to their pasture in the fields out of the wood, and he must go forth right early so that he may look at the ground and judge well, and if he sees anything that pleases him he can break boughs and lay his mark and cast round as before is said.
Also a man may go in quest among young wood, and although he has been in the morning and (seen) nought, nevertheless he should not neglect to quest with his lymer when it is high day when all the deer have gone to their lairs, for peradventure the hart will sometimes have gone into the wood before the hunter and lymer came to quest for him.
Also a hunter may go in quest and put himself and his lymer in the great thickets by high time of day, as I have said, for it befalleth sometimes that harts are so malicious, that they pasture within themselves, that is to say within their covert, and go not out to the fields nor to the coppices nor to the young wood, especially when they have heard the hounds run before in the forest once or twice. He must have affeeted (trained) his lymer in such a manner that he neither opens nor quests197 when he hunts in the morning, for he would make the hart void, and that must be by high noon, as I have said, when all beasts are in their lairs. And if his lymer find anything he should hold him short and lead him behind him, and look what deer it is, and if it be anything that pleases him, then he shall sue with his lymer till the time that he has brought it into some thicket, and then he shall break his boughs and take the scantilon and cast round as is before said, and then return home again to the assembly that in England is called a meeting or gathering.
197 Should not give tongue.
198 In the text of our MS. (the Vespasian) no break occurs here, but in the table of chapters at the beginning of the MS. the chapter as here given is enumerated, and this corresponds also with the Shirley and other MSS.
Also I will tell you how a hunter should go in quest among clear spires, and among high trees, and specially when it has rained the night before and in the morning. Eke in the time when the heads of the harts be tender, commonly they abide among clear spires and in high woods, for a thick country peradventure would do harm to their heads which be tender. If he meets rain as I before have said, or when their heads (are tender, and he meeteth199) anything that pleaseth him, he should not follow it with his lymer, for they remain in such a country as I have said in that time, that is to say in rain and when their heads are tender, for he might make the deer void into some other place of the quests as it is before said. And whoso meets him in the wood in sight of his eyes, then he must set his lymer in his fues. And if it be a deer that enter-changeth,200 that is to say if a deer puts his hind feet in the trace of the forefeet without passing on, it is no good token, but if he sets his hinder feet far from the fore feet it is a good token, for when a hart entre-marcheth it is a token that he is a light deer and well running and of great flight, for if he had a side belly and great flanks he could not entre-marche, but the contrary would he do.201 And sometimes when the hart makes a long stride with the hind foot, commonly they cannot fly well, and have been little hunted. And if he has of the fumes, he should put them in his horn with grass, or in his lap202 with grass, for a man should not bear them in his hand, for they would all break. And when he should meet in the fields anything that pleaseth him, he should draw towards his covert, for to make him draw the sooner to his stronghold, and when he findeth where he goeth in, then he should break a bough towards the place where the hart is gone, and take the scantilon, and follow him no further in the wood. Then he should make a long turn and cast round about by some ways or by-paths, and if he sees that he hath not passed out of his turn, he may return again to the gathering, and make them his report, and if it be so that he pass there where he would umbicast (cast round) and make his turn, and his lymer before him, then he should look if it is the same hart he had umbicast (cast round), and if he cannot well see at his ease, then he should reconnoitre the country till he can see easily and plainly, but have a care that his lymer open not, and if his lymer be dislave203 (be wild), let him investigate it with his eye. And if he seeth that it is his first hart he should not follow him, but then he should take another turn and umbicast. He must look that he go not along the ways, for it is the worst sueing that is: for the lymer commonly overshoots. But he should go a little way off the paths on one side or the other, until he (the hart) be within his turn, for then he is most securely harboured and the search shall be shorter. But if he see that it be too late to run him with strength, and if he see that the hart goes but softly pacing towards his stronghold he need not do all these things. And I pray him where he hath met with the hart, or harboured him in his stronghold or in coppices or in other thickets, that he take all his blenches (tricks) and his ruses before said, to be more secure, and to make a shorter search, if he hath time to do as I have said. Thus I have rehearsed the readiness that belongs to the harbouring of the hart. And now will I devise where men will best find them in bellowing time. It is known that they begin to bellow fifteen days before grease time204 ends, especially old deer, and also if the end of August and the beginning of September be wet and rainy.
199 The scribe who copied the Vespasian MS. omitted the bracketed words.
200 See Appendix: Hart.
201 The explanation of this sentence is that a stag which entre-marched or sur-marched, or in other words placed the hind foot on the track or beyond the track made by the front foot, was a thin or light deer, and therefore not a fat stag, which latter was what the hunter would be looking for.
202 Lappet of his coat.
203 Shirley MS. Dislavee—obsolete word meaning going beyond bounds, immoderate.
204 After grease time. See Appendix: Grease Time.
Also a good hunter should go before daybreak to hear the harts bellow which peradventure bellow in the forest in divers parts, and to look by the bellowing of the harts which seemeth to him the greatest. And always hearkening nearer and nearer under the wind, in such wise that when he will begin to sue, that he need nothing but to bring the lymer to the fues. And anon when he seeth that it is a hart that he findeth, uncouple the finders, but not too many, and this, for fear of falling in danger (of losing the right deer), should be done right early as soon as men can see day-light, for in that time the harts chase the hinds, and go hither and thither and abide no while in one place as they do in the right season. And because a man cannot come nigh him with a lymer, it is good to uncouple the hounds, for the hounds will get nigh them quicker and the bolder hounds will soon dissever (separate) the harts from the hinds. The harts bellow in divers manners, according as they be old or young, and according whether they be in a country where they have not heard the hounds, or where they have heard them. Some of them bellow with a full open mouth and often cast up their heads. And these be those that have heard the hounds only a little in the season, and that are well heated and swelled. And sometimes about high noon they bellow as before is said. The others bellow low and great and stooping with the head, and the muzzle towards the earth, and that is a token of a great hart, and an old and a malicious, or that he hath heard the hounds, and therefore dare not bellow or only a few times in the day, unless if it be in the dawning. And the other belloweth with his muzzle straight out before him, bolking and rattling in the throat, and also that is a token of a great and old hart that is assured and firm in his rut. In short all the harts that bellow greatest and mightiest by reason should be greatest and oldest.
The assembly that men call gathering should be made in this manner: the night before that the Lord or the Master of the Game will go to the wood, he must cause to come before him all the hunters and the helps, the grooms and the pages, and shall assign to each one of them their quests in a certain place, and separate the one from the other, and the one should not come into the quest of the other, nor do him annoyance or hinder him. And every one should quest in his best wise, in the manner that I have said; and should assign them the place where the gathering shall be made, at most ease for them all, and the nearest to their quests. And the place where the gathering shall be made should be in a fair mead well green, where fair trees grow all about, the one far from the other, and a clear well or beside some running brook. And it is called gathering because all the men and the hounds for hunting gather thither, for all they that go to the quest should all come again in a certain place that I have spoken of. And also they that come from home, and all the officers that come from home should bring thither all that they need, every one in his office, well and plenteously, and should lay the towels and board clothes all about upon the green grass, and set divers meats upon a great platter205 after the lord's power. And some should eat sitting, and some standing, and some leaning upon their elbows, some should drink, some laugh, some jangle, some joke and some play—in short do all manner of disports of gladness, and when men be set at tables ere they eat then should come the lymerers and their grooms with their lymers the which have been questing, and every one shall say his report to the lord of what they have done and found and lay the fumes before the lord he that hath any found, and then the Lord or the Master of the hunting by the counsel of them all shall choose which they will move and run to and which shall be the greatest hart and the highest deer. And when they shall have eaten, the lord shall devise where the relays shall go and other things which I shall say more plainly, and then shall every man speed him to his place, and all haste them to go to the finding.