WILD SPORT IN BRITTANY. 289 



a roar of melody. Before, however, the sharpest of the peasants 

 could reach the far end of the forest, the wily brute had broken 

 cover, and like an arrow had gone straight away for Pontargoned 

 and the great forests beyond Huelgoet. 



The scent was too good to stop them, so there was nothing 

 for it but to follow the hounds as we best could to that vast 

 woodland ; and luckily, the roads, proving more favourable than 

 usual, enabled us to catch an occasional view of them as they 

 broke into open ground or topped a hill on their onward course. 

 But now arose a difficulty with which, in that labyrinth of cover, 

 it was hopeless to contend. No sooner had the hounds reached 

 the dense portion of it that lies on the Monts d'Arree side, than a 

 brace of fresh wolves were roused, and from that moment Shafto, 

 Keryfan, and I did our utmost to stop the hounds. This, how- 

 ever, was no easy task, and but for the accidental help of some 

 peasants engaged in felling timber and clearing the brushwood, 

 it would probably have been more than our jaded horses would 

 have enabled us to accomplish. 



While thus engaged, an unexpected but a very welcome 

 object, in the form of a man, emerged from a turf cabin hard 

 by. This was no other than the lost charcoal-burner, who, little 

 aware of the intense anxiety occasioned by his disappearance, 

 was somewhat surprised at the warm greeting he met with from 

 our party. His story was soon told. On quitting the Hermitage, 

 he had travelled but a short distance before he fell in with a 

 company of woodmen proceeding to Pontargoned ; and, being 

 persuaded by them to take a share of the labour in which they 

 were engaged, he had struck in, and from that day followed the 

 vocation at which we had found him. On hearing the glad 

 tidings of the man's safety, Annette's relief can scarcely be 

 described, and the following night the first for a whole week, 

 as she declared were her dreams undisturbed by the terrible 

 Loup-garou. 



