CHAPTER XII 



OF THE MANNER AND HABITS AND 

 CONDITIONS OF HOUNDS 



After that I have spoken of the nature of beasts 

 of venery and of chase which men should hunt, 

 now I will tell you of the nature of the hounds 

 which hunt and take them. And first of their 

 noble conditions that be so great and marvellous 

 in some hounds that there is no man can believe 

 it, unless he were a good skilful hunter, and well 

 knowing, and that he haunted them long, for a 

 hound is a most reasonable beast, and best know- 

 ing of any beast that ever God made. And yet 

 in some case I neither except man nor other thing, 

 for men find it in so many stories and (see) so 

 much nobleness in hounds, always from day to 

 day, that as I have said there is no man that liveth, 

 but must think it. Nevertheless natures of men 

 and all beasts go ever more descending and de- 

 creasing both of life and of goodness and of 

 strength and of all other things so wonderfully, 

 as the Earl of Foix Phebus sayeth in his hook^ that 

 when he seeth the hounds that be now hunting 

 and thinketh of the hounds that he hath seen in 



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