BLOOD-HOUND, the name of a hound celebrated for its exquisite scent and unwearied perseverance, qualities which were taken advan tage of, by training it not only to the pursuit of game, but to the chase of man. A true Blood-Hound (and the pure blood is rare) stands about 28 inches in height, muscular, compact, and strong; the forehead is broad, and the face narrow towards the muzzle ; the nostrils are wide and well developed; the ears are large, pendulous, and broad at the base ; the aspect is serene and sagacious ; the tail is long, with an upward curve when in pursuit, at which time the hound opens with a voice deep and sonorous, that may be heard down the wind for a very long distance.
The colour of the true breed is stated to be almost invariably a reddish-tan, darkening gradually towards the upper parts till it becomes mixed with black on the back ; the lower parts, limbs, and tail being of a lighter shade, and the muzzle tawny. Pennant adds, "a black spot over each eye," but the blood-hounds in the possession of Thomas Astle, Esq. (and they were said to have been of the .original blood) had not these marks. Some, but such instances were not common, had a little white about them, such as a star in the face, &c. The better opinion is, that the original stock was a mixture of the deep-mouthed southern hound, and the powerful old English stag-hound.
Gervase Markham, in his Rustique,' speaking of bounds, says :—" The baie-coloured ones have the second place for goodnesse, and are of great courage, ventring far, and of a quicke scent, finding out very well the turves and windings they runne surely, and with great boldnesse, commonly loving the stagge more than any other beast, but they make no account of hares. It is true, that they be more head-strong and harde to reelaime than the white, and put men to more pains and travail about the same. The best of the fallow sort of dogges are those which are of a brighter hairs, drawing more unto the colour of red, and having therewithall a white spot in the forehead, or in the necks, in like manner those which are all fallow : but such as incline to a light yellow colour, being graie or blacke spotted, are nothing worth : such as are trussed up and have dewelawes, are good to make bloud-hounds."
Our ancestors soon discovered the infallibility of the Blood-Hound in tracing any animal, living or dead, to its resting place. To train it the young dog aeecompanied by a staunch old hound was led to the spot whence a deer or other animal had been taken on for a mile or two ; the hounds were then laid on and encouraged, and after hunting this drag' successfully, were rewarded with a portion of the venison which composed it. The next step was to take the young dog, with his seasoned tutor, to a spot whence a man whose shoes had been rubbed with the blood of a deer had started on a circuit of two or three miles : during his progress the man was instructed to renew the blood from time to time, to keep the scent well alive. His cikuit was gradually enlarged at each succeeding lesson, and the young hound, thus entered and trained, became at last fully equal to hunt by itself, either for the purposes of wood craft, war, or 'following gear,' as the pursuit after the property plundered in a border foray was termed. Indeed, the name of this variety of Canis domesticus, to which Linnaeus applied the name of sagar, cannot be mentioned without calling up of feudal castles with their train of knights and warders, and all the stirring events of those old times when the best tenure was that of the strong band.
Sir Walter Scott gives a striking reality to the scene, when he makes the moss-trooper, William of Deloraine, who had "baffled Percy's host blood-hounds," allude to the pleasure of the Chace, though he himself was the object of pursuit, in pronouncing his eulogy over Richard Musgrave.
In the same Lay of the Last Minstrel' there is ono of the best poetical descriptions of the blood-hound in action, if not the best; for though Somerville's lines may enter snore into detail, they want the vivid animation of the images brought absolutely under the eye by the power of Scott, where the "noble child," the heir of Branksome, is left alone in his terror.