1 1 2 WOLF-HUNTING. 



the scene so faithfully, if he had not himself heard the " sweet 

 thunder" of Sir Thomas Lucy's or some other Warwickshire 

 Squire's hounds : 



"Never did I hear 



Such gallant chiding ; for besides the groves, 

 The skies, the fountains, every region near, 

 Seemed all one mutual cry. I never heard 

 So musical a discord, such sweet thunder." 



Ten couple of these huge rough hounds, in the full enjoyment 

 of a fresh drag, on which every hound threw his tongue freely, 

 might well be a sound to gladden a hunter's heart; but, so 

 filled was the valley with the reiterations of a thousand echoes, 

 that it was impossible to make out in what direction the hounds 

 were pointing; and had it not been for the worn, wet paths, 

 impressed by the footmarks of the eager pack, which I traversed 

 with rapid strides, I should have missed seeing the grandest 

 passage in the day's sport, namely, the rousing of the boar in 

 that pile of rocks. Verily, he was a monster, but active as a 

 mountain cat, in spite of his Ungainly shape and huge size. 

 When first found, he was lying in the open, under cover of an 

 impending ledge, mantled with ivy and stunted oak ; but the 

 ground being exposed, and at some distance above the grand 

 clitter, he rapidly descended the broken ground, bounding like 

 a chamois from the head of one boulder to another, clearing 

 chasms in his stride, and at length disappearing in a subterranean 

 passage beneath the rocky mass. Several shots had been fired by 

 the peasants ; but whether or not he had been wounded at all was 

 a matter of much doubt among those who had reserved their fire. 



The fate of the hounds became now a matter of the most 

 intense interest to all. The whole pack had been uncoupled, 

 and were hard and close upon his quarters as the brute took 

 refuge in the superincumbent mass. In one instant every hound 

 was lost to sight ; and then commenced an uproar and a wailing 

 such as torture only could upraise the shriek of hounds in their 



