eir staves, and scaring every animal before them. Flights of
wood-pigeons, coveys of partridges, birds of every size, species, and
plumage, pass like moving shadows above their heads. The owls, too,
suddenly aroused from sleep, leave their dark holes, and, blinded by the
light, fly against the branches in their alarm with cries of
terror--probably imagining the order of night and day is reversed, and
that the unusual and unearthly noises proclaim that the end of the world
has arrived for the owls. Then come the roebuck and the foxes, bounding
and breaking through the underwood, and the hares and rabbits, which
jump up under the feet of the beaters.

Motionless as a mile-stone at your post, and rifle ready, this flying
legion of animals gives you a twinge of impatience, for you must allow
them a free passage, as in these _battues_ one dare not fire at
anything, save and except the great object of the day, the wolf. Wolves
alone have the honour on these important occasions of receiving the
contents of your double-barrel. But the cowards, divining what is in
preparation for them, are the last to show themselves; as the line
advances, they trot up and down the portion of the wood thus enclosed,
seeking for an outlet, or some break in the line; and they never make up
their minds to advance to the front until the tempest of sounds behind
them is almost ringing in their ears. But now the thunder of voices,
till then distant, approaches, and the cries and hallooing of the
peasants, like a flowing tide, forces them to draw nearer to the
huntsmen.

Whether or no, that fatal line must now be passed, and the few minutes
that precede the last movement of the wolves towards it brings to every
sportsman sensations impossible to describe. He knows the brutes are in
his rear, approaching, and a feeling like an electric current runs at
this exciting moment from one to the other; every man's finger is on his
trigger, his pulse throbs at a feverish pace, his heart beats like the
clapper of a bell in full swing--all, to take a surer aim, kneel, or
place their back against the nearest tree, and each offers up a prayer
for aid to his patron saint. This nervous moment has sometimes such an
effect upon ardent and excitable imaginations, that I have observed many
young sportsmen look very queer, some actually tremble and one shed
tears. But the _traqueurs_ are at hand, and the largest and boldest of
the wolves, placing themselves in front, are