Some Poets Dogs. 319 



Flecked here and there^ in gay enamelled pride 



Rival the speckled pard ; his rush-grown tail 



O'er 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 tlie steepy hill 



Or far extended plain ; in ev'ry part 



So well proportioned that the nicer skill 



Of Phidias himself can't blame thy choice ; 



Of such compose the pack. 



But here a mean 

 Observe, nor the large hound prefer. 



For hounds of middle size, active and strong, 



WiU better answer all thy various ends 



And crown thy pleasing labours with success. " 



For " the amphibious otter " or " stately stag " he advises 



" The deep-flewed hound, 

 Strong, heavy, slow, but sure ; 



Whose ears down-hanging from his thick round head 

 Shall sweep the morning dew, whose clanging voice 

 Awake the mountain echo in her cell 

 And shake the forests. " 



And then comes a page or two on the " lime-hound " — 



" The bold Talbot kind 

 Of these the prime, as white as Alpine snows. 

 And great their use of old " 



on the Borders to track human culprits, cattle-lifters, and 

 horse-thieves. 



A whole book then follows on the virtues of the beagle 

 and the merits of hare-hunting, but reverting, as antithesis 

 to " so mean a prey," to the sketch of a wild beast hunt in 

 the days of the Great Mogul Book III. finds us back in 

 England in the days of King Edgar and wolves, and from 

 the wolf the transition is easy to the fox. 



