LETTER II. 



OLD STORIES. 



HE old stories to which this letter is devoted 

 are of various dates, and stand on very 

 different degrees of evidence. Like the 

 earliest records in some graver histories, 

 they seem to commence in the legendary age, 

 and to have something mythic about them; but 

 they will be found to improve both in internal pro- 

 bability and in external evidence as they proceed, 

 till they arrive at the period when I can myself gua- 

 rantee their truth. 



Fulwar, the first of the three Lords Craven of 

 whom I have made mention, was a mighty hunter, 

 and kept foxhounds from about the year 1740 till his 

 death in 1764. During part of that period he used to 

 bring his hounds every season to Dummer, and hunt 

 the adjoining country. It was from this kennel that 

 the extraordinary but well-authenticated circumstance 

 occurred, which I have read, when a boy, in some 

 book of natural history, though I know not where to 

 find it now. Two or three draft hounds had been 

 sent by Lord Craven to Blair Athol in Scotland, and 

 had been taken part of the way by sea, but found 



