APPENDIX. 



279 



p. A. Bargnei 

 Cyneg. v. 



Fleckt here and tlicre, in gay enamell'd pride, 



Rival the speckled pard ; his rush-grown tail 



OVr his broad back bends in an ample arch ; 



On shoulders clean, upright and firm he stands ; 



His round cat-foot, straight hams, and wide-spread thighs, 



And his low-dropping chest, confess his speed, 



His strength, his wind, or on the stecpy hill, 



Or far-extended plain ; in every part 



So well-proportion'd, that the nicer skill 



Of Phidias himself can't blame thy choice. 



The Talbot, whose portrait is also sketched by the Latin poet of 

 Barga, as well as by the authors cited, is at present fallen into dis- 

 repute — his slowness of foot being scarce compensated by his keen- 

 ness of scent. The fleeter Leverarius, whose consimilarity with the 

 Gratian Petronius almost approaches to identity, was apparently 

 unknown to M. A. Biondi ; for he holds it quite impossible (like 

 the elder Xenophon in regard to the fair capture of the hare with his 

 aXuTreKibes at forct) that any hounds should have speed sufficient to De Canibus et 

 run down a fox, without the aid of wily instruments of destruction. ^ bellus. 

 But the largest varieties of Somerville's last picture are found a 

 match for the arch-felon, " vulpem captare dolosam," — the only 

 approach to the modern mode of pursuing whom, which the classics 

 afford, is in the fourth book of Oppian's Cynegetics, where the Kvves 

 aoWkes are evidently a pack of hounds, though we look in vain for 

 the well-mounted hunters ; 



KepZii 5' ovre \6xoi(nv aXdifftfios, ovre fipSxoiffiv, 

 ovre \lt>ois' Setvi] yap iirtcppoffwiytn vorjffai, 



Cyneg. iv 

 vs. 448. 



1. The difficulty of capturing the fox is indicated, according to Bochart, by mylho- 

 loo-ists, in the fable of the Teumesian fox, the " altera pestis" of Bceotian Thebes, 

 which, in the song of Sir Arthur Gelding, 



— wrought the bane of many a wight. The countrie folke did feed 

 Him with their cattle and themselves, untill (as was agreed) 

 That all the youthful! gentlemen that dwelled thereabout 

 Assembling, pitcht their corded toyles the champion fields throughout. 

 But net, ne toyle was none so hie that could his wightnesse stop, 

 He mounted over at his ease the highest of the top. 

 Then every man let slip their grewnds, but he them all oustript 

 And even as nimbly as a bird in daliance from them whipt, &c. 



Hierozoicon 

 L. III. c. XIII. 



Ovid. Met. 

 L. VII. 763. 



Golding's 

 Ovid's Metam. 

 Booke seventh. 



