82 A MONTH IN THE FOKESTS OF FRANCE. 



animal and fought occasionally at his head. Still it 

 did not stop ; but every now and then I could dis- 

 tinctly hear the rush of the boar in his charge, and 

 the cry of some hound in anticipation of a wound, or 

 really knocked over. Waiting in expectation that 

 the boar would stop and turn to bay, when the cry 

 came in the thick cover to within forty yards of me 

 I heard the boar scream, and in an instant my leg 

 was thrown over the saddle, and, hanging dear old 

 Coco's bridle to a tree, I made in, not aware that 

 there was any other soul near. As I was forcing my 

 way up to the sounds of fight, and when within ten 

 yards of the place, bang bang went two guns exactly 

 opposite to me, and then there was a cessation of all 

 noise, while with a rush I came full upon the dead 

 boar. 



M. Brunier's two servants had made in from an 

 opposite side unknown to me, and had fired on the 

 stricken boar, whom the hounds themselves had 

 pulled down, exhausted from two gun-shots he had 

 received, the first in the body, and the second from 

 M. Brunier, who at a long distance had broken a 

 hinder leg. 



The men, one of them the huntsman, apologised 

 for giving the coup de grace, not knowing that I was 

 so close at hand. Having pulled the boar into the 



