88 A MONTH IN THE TOEESTS OF FRANCE. 



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Do you think we shall come upon a boar to-day?" 

 was the first question I asked. 



'^ Oh, no ! " the rejoinder ; " no boars : we go to 

 find the roe." 



Oh ! what a lovely morning it was when Jules 

 and Maurice d'Anchald and myself, accompanied by 

 a smoke-dried looking fellow, dignified with the name 

 of huntsman simply because he could play on the 

 French horn, started from the chateau, and took our 

 way through those splendid woods, every pressure of 

 our shoulders through the leafy boughs offering up 

 fresh incense to the altar of St. Hubert, as the fading 

 and bruised leaf of the varied copse sighed that the 

 summer was over, though, like the vase of Moore, 

 its scent in death was as sweet or even sweeter than 

 ever. On we went, everything around us fresh and 

 beautiful, save when a horrid whiff" from the servant's 

 pipe reminded me of passing some pothouse door. 



" Heavens ! " I thought, " how much that man loses 

 by shutting out the perfumes of the woods with that 

 inferior weed ! " 



Maurice, who hunted the hounds, had them all 

 around him in couples as usual ; but in such a wood- 

 land as this, with only a few narrow paths in it, and 

 thick lying up to our very feet, and the drag of 

 animals of chase crossing in all directions, hounds 



