having been drowned by
otters, which they had seized under water, for they can sustain the
want of respiration for a much longer time than the dog.

Mr. Daniell, in his "Rural Sports," remarks that hunting the otter was
formerly considered as excellent sport, and that hounds were kept
solely for that purpose. The sportsmen went on each side of the river,
beating the banks and sedges with the dogs. If an otter was not soon
found, it was supposed that he had gone to _couch_ more inland, and
was sought for accordingly. If one was found, the sportsmen viewed his
track in the mud, to find which way he had taken.

"On the soft sand,
See there his seal impress'd! And on that bank
Behold the glitt'ring spoils, half-eaten fish,
Scales, fins, and bones, the leavings of his feast."

The spears were used in aid of the dogs. When an otter is wounded, he
makes directly to land, where he maintains an obstinate defence:--

"Lo! to yon sedgy bank
He creeps disconsolate; his numerous foes
Surround him, hounds and men. Pierc'd through and through,
On pointed spears they lift him high in air;
Bid the loud horns, in gaily warbling strains,
Proclaim the spoiler's fate: he dies, he dies."

The male otter never makes any complaint when seized by the dogs, or
even when transfixed with a spear, but the females emit a very shrill
squeal. In the year 1796, near Bridgenorth, on the river Wherfe, four
otters were killed. One stood three, another four hours before the
dogs, and was scarcely a minute out of sight. In April 1804, the
otter-hounds of Mr. Coleman, of Leominster, killed an otter of
extraordinary size. It measured from the nose to the end of the tail,
four feet ten inches, and weighed thirty-four and a half pounds. This
animal was supposed to be eight years old, and to have destroyed for
the last five years a ton of fish annually. The destruction of fish by
this animal is, indeed, very great, for he will eat none unless it be
perfectly fresh, and what he takes himself. By his mode of eating them
he causes a still greater consumption, for so soon as an otter catches
a fish he drags it on shore, devours it to the vent, and, unless
pressed by extreme hunger, always leaves the remainder, and takes to
the water in search of more. In rivers it is always observed to swim
against the stream, in order to meet its prey.

Otters bite very severely, an