280 The Hunting Field With Horse and Hound 



legs form the pivot of his action. His shoulders are deep, 

 heavy, and muscular, and carry at least two thirds of his 

 weight. He is covered with a close fitting coat of wiry hair 

 that protects the toughest of liides, like an armour plate on a 

 man of war. 



During the reign of Louis XI, we are told, if not before, 

 the chase of the wild boar was elevated to the sport of kings. 

 The customs inaugurated by this sporting monarch have very 

 generally been followed to the present day. Since then the 

 sport has always attracted the nobility of the country, and 

 although there are but few wild boar hunting establishments 

 in France at the present time — owing to the scarcity of forests 

 of sufficient size to attract the game — the few gentlemen who 

 still carry it on, do so in a princely fashion, preserving, as 

 far as practicable, the customs and usages of ye olden times. 



There are but a few places in France where the wild boar 

 is hunted and these estabhshments are not hunt clubs as in 

 England and America, where anyone is at liberty to join; but 

 are private packs, under the exclusive management of certain 

 wealthy, or titled gentlemen, who own the hounds and every- 

 thing pertaining to the establishment; and who only welcome 

 such people to the chase as the Master delights to honour. 



It was, therefore, with good old fashioned schoolboy delight 

 that the writer received an invitation from the Baron de Dor- 

 lodot to spend a week with himself and his family at his beauti- 

 ful hunting retreat, in the heart of the great forest of Se- 

 nouches. 



The Baron de Dorlodot is easily first among the great 

 sportsmen of France. His name is everywhere known on the 

 continent, and in England and America, as the champion 

 pigeon shot of Europe. Among the prominent events that 

 have fallen to his gun in pigeon shooting is the great Paris 

 prize of 1868, offered by the Emperor Napoleon. At INIonaco, 

 in 1885, he won the twenty thousand franc prize and a cup 



