THE FOREST OF MAHLY. 115 



CHAPTER IX. 



THE FOREST OF MAIILY ANECDOTES OF BOAR SHOOTING THE POACHER 

 ANECDOTES OF CHARLES X. 



I WAS on terms of friendship and intimacy with a French 

 nobleman attached to the Court of Charles X. who was always 

 in attendance on the royal hunting and shooting parties, 

 and who related to me at different times many anecdotes 

 connected with them ; some of which may not be wholly un- 

 interesting to my readers. Being on one occasion present at 

 a chasse at Marly, on our return to Paris, he gave me the 

 following particulars relative to scenes that had come under 

 his cognizance in the neighbourhood of this celebrated forest. 



" The village of Noisy is not very well known, even to the 

 Parisians. The cross-roads that lead to it are far removed 

 from the principal highways in the vicinity of Paris; still 

 there are few country villages more pleasantly or prettily 

 situated, with its white cottages and red tiles, contrasting 

 with the green foliage of the elms which overshaded the 

 hill upon the side of which it is built, and which protects it 

 from the north winds. It stands upon the very edge of the 

 forest of Marly, as approached from the plain. 



" Just beyond Noisy, at the entrance of the forest, is a large 

 gateway of carved stone, of the architecture of the period 

 Louis XV., and it was through this gate that Charles X. 

 always passed with his suite when he hunted in the forest of 

 Marly. The broken nature of the ground, continual indenta- 

 tions of the surface, and perpetual succession of small hills and 

 vales, rendered the chase on horseback difficult and inconve- 

 nient, although the forest contained an abundance of deer and 



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