THE WOLF. 



eye-balls are of a fiery-green colour, which greatly contributes to the fierce 

 and formidable air with which he is fo itrongly marked. His ears are fharp 

 and eretft ; his jaws and teeth are large and itrong ; his tail long and bufiry, 

 bending inwards between his hind legs. His body is covered with long 

 harm hair, the colour of which is a mixture of brown, black, and grey, with 

 a tinge of yellow ; beneath the hair he is well clothed with an alh-coloured 

 fur, which enables him, without inconvenience, to endure the feverity of the 

 climates he inhabits. 



The Wolf is naturally dull and cowardly, but being driven from the 

 habitations of man, and obliged to live in the forelt, where he finds but few 

 animals to fatisfy his rapacious appetite, he is often on the brink of fiarving. 

 Impelled thus by neceflity, he becomes regardlefs of danger, and boldly 

 attacks thofe animals which are under man's protection. Lambs, Sheep, 

 and even Dogs, or any animal he can carry off, are equally his prey. Thefe 

 depredations he renews, till having been harafled and intimidated by the 

 Dogs, he becomes prudent by experience, hides himfelf during the day, and 

 only ventures out by night, when numbers of them, afiembled together, 

 prowl round the villages, deltroying every creature they meet. Polfefied of 

 great ftrength in the mufcles of his neck and jaws, the Wolf runs off with 

 a Sheep or Lamb with the greater! facility. Indeed, theep-folds have always 

 been devoted to fcenes of his devaluation and carnage ; and when he 

 perceives, by his exquifite fmell, that the flocks are houfed, he undermines 

 the threlhold of the door with his claws, where he enters to the terror and 

 deftruction of the harmlefs, fleecy tribe, displaying the moll ferocious and 

 favage cruelty, by immolating all he finds, ere he carries any off, or his thirft 

 for blood feems fatiated. It has been afierted that, when the Wolf has once 

 tailed human blood (a), he always prefers it to any other; this prevailing notion 

 has given rife to many fuperflitious flories. The old Saxons imagined it was 

 polfefied by fome evil lpirit, and called it the Were- Wolf, or Man- Wolf (b), 

 and, to this day, the French peafants entertain fimilar notions. 



(a) Pennant. 



(b) Mr. Verftigan, who wrote in the year 1634, gives the following curious account of this fort of 

 fuperftition, " The Were- Wolves," fays he, " are certain forcerers, who having annoynted their bodies, with 



