WILD SPORT IN BRITTANY. 25 



" Oh, he would be safe enough," said the doctor ; " it was 

 the mare was the attraction ; and only in case of our being 

 down together would my life have been in danger. In Brittany 

 at least, no matter what their numbers nor what their need, 

 they never attack a human being, great or small, by day or night. 

 Man's dominion, given him by the Creator, is paramount here." 



I was fortunate enough that night to sit next to the Count 

 de Kergoorlas at dinner ; and hearing he was a master of wolf- 

 hounds in Upper Brittany, I gleaned from him some interesting 

 information with respect to the style of hound he considered 

 best adapted for his particular sport. 



"A big, bold, broken-haired hound is what I keep for the 

 work ; and occasionally I invigorate the race," said he, " with 

 a strain of wolf-blood." 



"And how, pray," I inquired, "do you manage that?" 



"Nothing is more simple. The dog and the wolf being 

 congeners they breed readily together ; nor does the law affecting 

 mules affect the hybrid race, as the offspring of the first cross 

 reproduce their litters with the same facility. I keep a dog-wolf 

 brought up by hand ; and he, suckled in infancy by a hound 

 dam, lives in perfect concord with any hounds I think fit to 

 enclose with him in his kennel ; while a day or two reconciles 

 a strange hound to his company." 



" And do you find the first cross," I asked, " as manageable 

 in chase as your ordinary hounds?" 



" Far from it," he replied ; " insomuch that I only keep that 

 produce to breed from. They usually run mute or all but mute, 

 and are so self-willed in chase and so fierce in kennel, that I 

 merely use them as stud hounds, and enter the second cross. 

 These, the grand-offspring of the wolf, become rare wolf-hounds, 

 fierce, fine-nosed, desperate in chase, and never tiring during 

 the longest day. But, to be candid, they have one great fault : 

 they are too shy of their tongue ; nor can this defect be bred 



