his active tail,
Attest his joy; then with deep op'ning mouth,
That makes the welkin tremble, he proclaims
Th' audacious felon; foot by foot he marks
His winding way, while all the listening crowd
Applaud his reasonings. O'er the watery ford,
Dry sandy heaths, and stony barren hills,
O'er beaten paths, with men and beasts distain'd,
Unerring he pursues; till at the cot
Arriv'd, and seizing by his guilty throat
The caitiff vile, redeems the captive prey:
So exquisitely delicate his sense!"--SOMERVILLE.

These noble dogs were also called "Slough dogs," in consequence of
their exploring the sloughs, mosses, and bogs, in pursuit of
offenders, called Moss-troopers. They were used for this purpose as
late as the reign of James the First. In Scotland they are called the
Sleuth-hound. It is the largest of any variety of hound, some of them
having measured from twenty-six to twenty-eight inches to the top of
the shoulder. They are beautifully formed, and have a noble expression
of countenance, so finely portrayed in Sir Edwin Landseer's well-known
and beautiful picture of "Dignity and Impudence." There is, as Colonel
Hamilton Smith has observed, a kind of sagacious, or serious, solemn
dignity about him, admirably calculated to impress the marauder with
dread and awe. Indeed, so much is this the case, that I knew an
instance of a bloodhound having traced a sheep-stealer to his cottage
in Bedfordshire; and so great was the dread afterwards of the peculiar
instinct of this dog, that sheep-stealing, which had before been very
common in the neighbourhood, was put an end to. It has, therefore,
often occurred to me, that if bloodhounds were kept for the general
good in different districts, sheep-stealing would be less frequent
than it is at present. They might also be usefully employed in the
detection of rick-burners. At all events the suggestion is worth
some consideration, especially from insurance offices. In 1803,
the Thrapston Association for the Prosecution of Felons in
Northamptonshire, procured and trained a bloodhound for the detection
of sheep-stealers. In order to prove the utility of the dog, a man was
dispatched from a spot where a great concourse of people were
assembled, at ten o'clock in the forenoon, and an hour afterwards the
hound was laid on the scent. After a chase of an hour and a half, the
hound found him secreted in a tree many miles from the place of
starting.