WILD SPORT IN BRITTANY. 205 



escaped utter annihilation. However, by the time we reached 

 him, at least an hour after Kergoorlas and the peasants had slung 

 up the slain boar by the heels for future dissection, he was sound- 

 ing " La sortie de 1'eau " complacently on the river bank, and 

 without a symptom of his usual lively excitement. The hounds, 

 too, were sitting on their haunches, regarding with intent look the 

 boar, as she stood mid-waist in the water, her back arched like a 

 bow, her jaws smeared with froth, and her hind-quarters planted 

 firmly against the roots of a gnarled oak-tree. 



Shafto and half a score peasants were there, restraining the 

 hounds with rate and lash, until the stragglers, especially Keryfan 

 and myself, could be brought up by the well-known signal to see 

 the finish. St. Prix had ascertained the sex of the pig ; and, 

 although the crunch of a sow's jaws is no joke, it is not to be 

 compared to the rip of a tusker, who, if he gets a fair cut at limb 

 or body, leaves a life, if not a death mark, on the unlucky victim. 

 So St. Prix's complacency was at once accounted for ; he had 

 enjoyed, too, a fine run, and was now patiently awaiting the 

 arrival of his " field/' and resting his hounds, ere he 'loo'd them 

 on to their last attack. 



Men are all selfish animals ; and even among those devoted to 

 hunting, of all sports the most social, few there be who will not 

 confess to a certain amount of satisfaction in being able, either by 

 their own judgment or their steed's merits, or even by sheer luck, 

 to see "a good thing" across country, and to find themselves 

 living with hounds " alone in their glory," while the rest of the 

 "field" are "positively nowhere." The tendency to self-glorifi- 

 cation is, doubtless, at the root of this inward chuckle ; though, in 

 ten minutes after the ardour of the chase has evaporated, every 

 good fellow will hate himself for allowing his heart to entertain 

 so selfish a feeling. St. Prix, as he urged the gallant Barbe-bleu 

 down that rugged hill-side, and felt as if he was carried by 

 "A creature winged, I swear," 



