The Project Gutenberg EBook of Chambers' Edinburgh Journal, No. 421, New
Series, Jan. 24, 1852, by Various

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Title: Chambers' Edinburgh Journal, No. 421, New Series, Jan. 24, 1852

Author: Various

Release Date: January 6, 2005 [EBook #14612]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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CHAMBERS' EDINBURGH JOURNAL

CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, EDITORS OF 'CHAMBERS'S
INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE,' 'CHAMBERS'S EDUCATIONAL COURSE,' &c.

No. 421. NEW SERIES. SATURDAY, JANUARY 24, 1852. PRICE 1-1/2_d_

THE WOLF-GATHERING.

One winter evening some years ago, I sat with a small circle of
friends round the fire, in the house of a Polish gentleman, whom his
acquaintances agreed in calling Mr Charles, as the most pronounceable
of his names. He had fought in all his country's battles of the
unsuccessful revolution of 1831; and being one of the many who sought
life and liberty in the British dominions, on the failure of that last
national effort, he had, with a spirit worthy of an exiled patriot,
made the best of his unchosen fortunes, and worked his way up, through
a thousand difficulties and privations, to a respectable standing in
the mercantile profession. At the period mentioned, Mr Charles had
become almost naturalised in one of our great commercial towns, was a
member of a British church, and the head of a British household; but
when the conversation happened to turn on sporting matters round his
own fireside, he related in perfect seriousness the following wild and
legend-like story of his early life in Poland:--

The year before the rising, I went from my native place in Samogitia
(Szamait), to spend Christmas at the house of my uncle, situated in
the wooded country of Upper Lithuania. He was a nobleman who boasted
his descent from one of the oldest houses in Poland, and still held
the estate which his ancestors had defended for themselves through
many a Tartar invasion--as much land as a hunting-train could course
o