The Express.
London, England, 1857-11-28 00:00:00

LONDON, SATURDAY EVENING, NOVEMBER 28, 1857.

LITBRATUBA

A Month en Me Forests of Prance. By the lion.
BRANTLEY F. BERKELEY. London: Longman.
The political and domestic eccentricities of Mr.
()motley Berkeley are well known to the newspaper-
reading world, and his good qualities as a well-
trained, seasoned, keen, and ardent sportsman, are
equally familiar to all those with whom horses,
hounds, and guns stand as matters of paramount
importance. When, therefore, from the opening
pages of his book, we find that, powering the con-
stitutional irritability of his family, and having a
very indifferent knowledge of the k ranch language,
he started rid Havre for a chateau two hundred
miles to the southward of Paris in September, 1866,
unattended by any servant, taking with him
eleven packages, and "my two little white fox and
otter terriers, Nipper and Tacks, as well as a fine
bloodhound bitch, named Malwood, and four blood-
hound whelps, by Druid, in all seven," we prepare
for some amusement. Nor are we dilaVpointed on
farther perusal. Notwithstanding his vaunted
goad humour, it is plain from every page that
Mr. Berkeley is the best realisation of the con-
ventional travelling Englishman of the old school
that we have ever encountered—grumbling at the
. .

extravagance of fares, swearing 'at Parisian
theeoe,
became the man does not d lustros.-
goes he received, to "tarn about and gallop to the
French Tattersall's," mournfully complaining that
at foreign railway stations there are different offices
for the payment of different things belonging to the
lame passenger, threatening. to punch a cabman's
head" for extortion, wondering at the small size of
the ewer and jug supplied in the hotels, writing, in
fact, in that fine spirit of liberal impartiality which
has made the name of Englishman so justly beloved
throughout continental Europe. Arrived at his
friend's chateau he becomes more entertaining, and
if we can forget the pervading grumble, this portion
of the book is readable and interesting. The details
of the equipment of the French sportsmen, the
management of their hounds, and the manuer in
which otters, wolves, and boars are hunted by them,
are spirited and exciting. The following descrip-
tive bit of the death of a wolf will bear out our
praise :
The cry lien, save to one or two William' eioeptice,
died sway; bashes began to crack hen and there, and I
caught glimpses of blouse making their way up; so, mount-
ng ono, I walked gently on, listening to the diesel cry,
now so ar off that it came sowed with the air that brought
it. I was sitting in a ride, with my groom and two blouses,
when it struck my ear that there was • very remarkable
sullen bey proceeding from a single hound; it was a long
way ors and between me and the distant line of chase. 0,
csaionelly a lighter tongue or two seemed to back the sullen
bay, and, whatever those tongues were after, they shifted
their positions, and seemed to be bee, there, and everywhere.
Thinking that there was something in ii, I forebore all atten-
tion to the distant chase, and listened for nearer intimation,
leaving the society of the two blousee, dismounting, and
going on some little detanes on foot. I had not left the
blouse above ten minutes, when I heard that strange single
sullen bay again, evidently nearer to the spot I had jet left
than it had Weide been ; and then, as usual, • long silence.
Thin was broken by the several report. of the guns of the
two men I bed WI, bet not a weed was sled as to "spiels.-
des!. I kept my grovel and Wesel ; when wow-wow went
the sullen bay again, a long way cd. Wes-wow; Its com-
ing again this way. I had taken up a position against a
tree, when • keg, straight, but very inner path came
down into the ride M. which I bad left my horse, and I was
still listening for that bey again, when something silently
dashed into the extreme point of the little ride up which I
was looking, and came en directly towards me. That it was •
keend I knew, from the *bites. of the coat I ems ; but
why was it °medically so dark and so obscured, that a dins
substance kept shutting out the whiter pie of the bound front
my eyes' I stared at it, when tel at once the oddest now
and sight that could be best on my slvaa and astonished
muse. Down the path, right fee my legs, came a spleedid
cub dog wolf, quito beaten and by hia aide, and touching
him, a powerful French hound, able to go twice sa feat as the
wolf, but not daring to stop him—the wolf going with hie
Wad very low, but his hind quarters very high, hie brush
between his legs ; and every bristle on kiln beck set up the
wrong way ; his toegne oat end hie eye flashing fire while
from his capacious laws he emitted the fathers and mothers
of all the Slade I lad ever beard, by way of telling the
honed to keep his jaws off. The hound kept grunting at
• mistime behind hire, nudging his hind .quarters with
he chin—at ether time alongside of Lim, biking hie lip., and
pushing his nose against the top of the well's neck, lust es
TOY ••• • dog do when be meditate. pitching Into another.
All this done in a long heavy gallop, and beautifully illus-
trating my express, d *nice, that the seen hounds in
Frazee cannot catch a wolf in, that they do not come up
walk him in force eutticient to roll him over. .. . .

My gun was to my shoulder all this time, but I dared nut
Ere, on account of the hound ; in addition to which, the
sight was so deeply interesting, I did not desire to terminate
the fun till the very last moment. On they rune till the
wolf and hound were within two yards of my boots, when I
suddenly sisal one leg is the wolfs face, which made him
dash on one side, clear of the hound, and I et once fired.
The green cartridge never exploded, but like a bell it just
went over his shoulder and mimed him. lie then mused the
vide behind me, ping away slant ; and on the fleet oppor•
(unity *forded by the trees I rolled him over, when up
vmsag a blouse beyond, and right in the line of ray fire, end
Rued into him. How—he's dead r I exclaimed in
French. " Yell, sir," was the reply; when my groom rode
in, and, see matter of coarse with Frenchmen. hallooed at
his mare, eel flung the dead wolf on her crappie—where he
strapped it—a thing it would have been very difficult for
as to do with an English hone, even with a fez. My friend
the blouse twisting in thie, I rewarded him with something
to drink, mid in a short time wee joined by H. E. Brunkr
and three ur four hounds. Another cub wolf having been
viewed, we waited, In expectation that the hounds would be
bet.ught bark from their proverbially welt se clotse of the old
wolf, but in vain • so, having again been bendtablyrefrewbed
by some bread and wins from M. Brunier's dogcart, I pro-
ceeded on my way home.
In the description of his return journey, however,
Mr. Berkeley is at his old games again, grumbling
and complaining of everything foreign, and the
volume winds up with an account of a row at Havre
with some omnibus men and cab-driven, in which
our pugnacious Briton carried the head-punching
theory into practice, and was detained at Havre for
some days in consequence.
The moral to be deduced from the perusal of this
book is, that irascible elderly gentlemen, encum-
bered with luggage, bloodhound bitches and whelps,
and fox and other terriers, should remember Hood's
rhymed advice, and

Nora go to Franco
Union they know the lingo.

Mr. Grantley Berkeley's sporting experiences are
novel and entertaining, but the rest of the book is
offensive in its style and tone, and calculated to ren-
der the writer sn object of aversion to foreigners,
ar,d of pity to the more intelligent portion of his
countrymen.

SCIENTIFIC MEEFINOB FOR THE EN ;VINO WEEK.
—Monday—ltoyal Academy of Arts, 8 p.m.—(R. Pertridge,
Esq., on Anatomy.)- South Kensington Museum, 8 p.m.—
(Dr. Lyon Playfair on Science lumitutions, in couneoice
with the Department.)—lnstitute of Actumire—(Mr. Wit-
lich on a new Formula for the Expectation of Life ; and, on
the Value of Life Annuities yielding a given Rate of interest,
the Capital to reproduce the Purelsee-money being invested
at another Rate.) Thorley—R. S. Literature, 2 p.m.—(Pro-
feasts Christmas on Sbakepeare's Leer.)—Society of Arts,
7 p.m.—(Bpecial General Meeting.)—Civil Engineers, 8
p.m.—(Mr. Molectworth on the Conversion of Wood by Ma-
chinery, and Sir. T. 8. Sawyer on self-acting Tools for the
Mean tare of Engines and Ilotlers ) Widwesday—Deet.
mil, 7y—(Mr. James Y►tes on the Best Unit of Leagth.)—
Socisty of Arts, B—(Mr. Apetey Pellott on the Comparative
Beating Properties of Coal and Coke, in spud to Economy
eta the Smoke Nuisance) Geological—(fl. C. Sorby, Fag.,
on the Micromispieal Structure of Crystals, as applicable to
the delerntiesion of the MUeOUN or igneous origin of Mine.
rota and Rocky.)—Thunday —Chemical, 8. (Dr. Muller an
litoolk Acid. Mr. F. Field on the Arsenious of the Earths.)
fq p.m.—Antiquaries. 8 p.m.—Lioness. (1. Gar-
ner on the Shell beating Siollusons Animals, particularly
with regard to atm tore nod form. 1. Cobkold. General
observations on boor" with nodose of several new spiv
cicg. including, an miscount of Troia =rata, and T. cum-
merits. 3. 14elalst on the Fauna of NOW Oulisea)—Sstre,
dew —Asiatic, 2 p.m.
TITINI.% AND THE FAirtlEs."—One of those
singular, esceptionsl , and episodical pictures with which
;treat plank cm encesimes startle the world is now on view at
Mews Jennings's, Cheapsida We allude to Sir E. Land-
over s Titania and Iles Furies," a scene from the " Mid-
p.n., meg'. Bream," which, shown for a moment, boo
for a long time been a lost thing to the general public.
Every artist of oven five psis standing must remember the
audio tradition* about tbie fantod= with its Sonwe and
elves, and it. inimitable white 'titbit, with its spectral eyes,
will-o'-theesitip lighted, which quite echoers Timnia,—fer
the pieces* is a fairy animal picture, not a fairy picture.—
Athenaeum.