e gorged wolves,
their muzzles red with blood, are stretched snoring in their dens and
lurking-places--then it is the heavy boars, shaking off their laziness,
leave their sombre retreats--take to the open country, and trotting,
grunting, and with hesitating footsteps, come and plunge their awkward
and heavy bodies in the marshy waters, and wallow in the soft mud.

[1] Query,--fox-hunting and stag-hunting.--TRANSLATOR.

CHAPTER XIII.

Appearance of the _Mare_ in the morning--Forest etiquette--Mode of
obtaining possession of the best _Mare_--Every subterfuge fair--The
jocose sportsman--The quarrel--Reveries in the hut--Comparison
between meeting a lady and watching for a wolf.

The _Mares_ on the borders of which these scenes of strife and carnage
take place, are found by the morning sun surrounded by a crimson circle,
and all the horrid details of the battle-field--proof that the weak have
been slaughtered and overcome by the strong; a humiliating sight! for
the desolation created by the bad passions of man is far too like it.
Sometimes these _Mares_ are from two to three hundred feet in
circumference, and these may be truly termed the diamonds of the forest.
The _Mare_ No. 1., fed by small but always flowing springs, is full,
when others are dried up, and is frequented by troops of animals, savage
and meek, which thirst and heat drive there from all points of the
compass. These _Mares_, but little known, few in number, much sought
after--become, more especially at the period of the dog-days, very
difficult to find. Considered always as the property of the first comer,
the poacher, who is better acquainted than any other sportsman with the
localities in which they are to be found, generally takes up his
quarters near them late at night, and installs himself; sleeps there,
sups there, and, determined not to leave it under any pretext, laughs in
the face of the unfortunate wight who arrives after him, in the happy
delusion that he has anticipated every one else. For it is a forest law,
and acknowledged by all, that two sportsmen cannot, without disturbing
one another, sit down at the same _Mare_; possession is in this not only
nine but ten points of the law; and, if a mere lad, with a
fowling-piece, happens to place himself first on its banks, no giant
seven feet high would think of using his superior strength to expel him.

Such is the law--such is the custom--to act in defiance of it wou