THE SPANIEL, 73 



murdered by a falconer jealous of his favour, who con- 

 cealed his remains in the woods. None knew his fate, 

 till a dog, worn by famine and grief, came to Edmund 

 and fawned upon him with expressive gestures ; and 

 the king followed him to the spot where the body lay. 

 The murder was avenged, as it was thought, by the 

 enforcement of the Lex Talionis. The falconer was 

 put into Lodebroch's boat, and committed to the 

 mercy of the waves. Unfortunately, the purposes of 

 justice were not, in this case, achieved, for the wretch 

 was borne to Denmark, when, to avoid the torture, 

 he accused Edmund as the assassin of Lodebroch, and 

 was thus the occasion of the first Danish invasion. 

 The instances of attachment recorded of spaniels are 

 most numerous. They will sometimes take a liking 

 for kittens, and even birds ; but their general fondness 

 is for the human race. There is one affecting example 

 related of a spaniel in Paris, in 1799. It was so 

 severe a frost that the Seine was thickly frozen over ; 

 but a thaw had commenced, when a number of youths 

 chose still to continue the sport of skating. One, 

 named Beaumavoir, a young student, and the pos- 

 sessor of a small spaniel, had only gone on the 

 treacherous ice, near the quay of the Hotel des 

 Monnaies, when it broke, and his body disappeared 

 The small spaniel, by his frantic grief, gave the 

 alarm, but no assistance could be rendered ; and the 

 poor creature's howlings only served to warn others 

 from the unsafe spot. That day, and the following 

 night, the animal remained to watch for his master's 



