270 SPORTING IN BOTH HEMISPHERES. 



wild boars wander in troops, with the stag and fallow-deer, 

 or in the plains, where thousands of partridges and pheasants 

 have their nests, and hares are as thick as flocks of sheep ; 

 and all this is merely the programme of a delightful enter- 

 tainment, in which he can take no part. Indeed, a sports- 

 man who resides at Vienna during the spring deserves the 

 palm of martyrdom. 



I had passed about three months of this kind of purgatory, 

 when I was recompensed for my sufferings by an introduc- 

 tion to the Prince F S , one of the most amiable 



and intelligent of Austrian magnates, and who, without any 

 cold or haughty demeanour, was proverbial for his frank and 

 cordial hospitality towards strangers. 



This Prince, a great sportsman himself, took pity on 

 me, and proposed that we should go and kill some deer on 

 one of his estates in Hungary. 



Our departure was soon arranged. Leaving Vienna at 

 daybreak, we traversed the charming promenade of the 

 Prater. Attracted by the new-mown hay, herds of stags had 

 advanced as far as the first houses in the Faubourg of 

 Leopoldstadt. Some were ruminating beneath the trees of 

 the different avenues; others lay stretched upon the road 

 itself, and our coachman was absolutely forced to drive them 

 out of our way by strokes of his whip. We soon arrived at 

 the Danube, and the place of embarkation of the steam- 

 boats. 



The Danube, that king of European rivers, changes its 

 aspect completely after leaving the capital of Austria. I had 

 descended from Lintz to Vienna, where,, like the Rhine, it 

 flows through a mountainous country, and between hills 

 covered with dark pine forests ; after passing Vienna, on the 

 contrary, its course is through a level plain, rich with verdure 

 and cultivation of all kinds. At rare intervals, indeed, at 

 some angle of the stream, can be descried an ancient tower, 



