154 TflE NOBLE SCIENCE. 



her stern vibrates with the quickened action of her 

 pulses ; for a moment she ploughs the earth with her 

 nostrils, she whimpers out a half-suppressed emotion, 

 dashes a few yards forward, stoops again, and traverses 

 around her. " Yoi, wind him ! have at him, old darling ! 

 Yoi, touch on him ! Hey, wind him, old Governess ! Yoi, 

 2:)U8li him up !" A fox for a million. Onward she strikes, 

 throws back her graceful neck, rears high her head, and, 

 with a note of confidence, proclaims the joyful tidings of 

 a find. Like hosts that rally round their standard, at the 

 trumpet's call, come boundiug through the brake the 

 merry throng ; the huntsman's cheer is responded to by 

 a rapid succession of 



throats, 



" With a whole gamut filled with heavenly notes." 



It is a moment of intense, I had almost written, of pain- 

 ful interest ; so nearly do extremes meet, so close is the 

 conjunction between the most pleasurable sensations and 

 those of an opposite character. While hope is mount- 

 ing almost to delight, anxiety is bordering upon fear. 

 The action has commenced, the huntsman's heart and 

 soul are thrown amidst the pack, he has neither eyes nor 

 ears for aught beside, all is right at present ; but any 

 one of a hundred probable mischances may mar the tide 

 of fortune. A few short, sharp, and shrill notes of the 

 horn, alternating with a cheery " hoic ! hoic ! hoic, 

 together, hoic !" fill up the pauses in this grand overture 

 to the approaching opera. The huntsman is, as he 

 always should be, literally with his hounds ; the second 



