Anon the notes of individual hounds could be distinguished; now the sharp, savage treble of some fleet brach, now the deep bass of some southron talbot, rising above or falling far below the diapason of the pack—and now, shrill and clear, the long, keen flourish of a Norman bugle.
At the last signal, Kenric rose silently but quickly to his feet, while his dog, though evidently excited by the approaching rally of the chase, remained steady at his couchant position, expectant of his master's words. The snow-white alans, on the contrary, fretted, and strained, and whimpered, fighting against their leashes, while Eadwulf sat still, stubborn or stupid, and animated by no ambition, by no hope, perhaps scarce even by a fear.
But, as the chase drew nigher, "Up, Eadwulf!" cried his brother, quickly, "up, and away. Thou'lt have to stretch thy legs, even now, to reach the four lane ends, where the relays must be, when the stag crosses. Up, man, I say! Is this the newer spirit you spoke of but now? this the way you would earn largess whereby to win your freedom? Out upon it! that I should say so of my own brother, but thou'lt win nothing but the shackles, if not the thong. Away! lest my words prove troth."
Eadwulf the Red arose with a scowl, but without a word, shook himself like a water-spaniel, and set off at a dogged swinging trot, the beautiful high-bred dogs bounding before his steps like winged creatures, and struggling with the leashes that debarred their perfect freedom—the man degraded, by the consciousness of misery and servitude, into the type of a soulless brute—the brutes elevated, by high breeding, high cultivation, and high treatment, almost into the similitude of intellectual beings.
Kenric looked after him, as he departed, with a troubled eye, and shook his head, as he lost sight of him among the trees in the fore-ground. "Alack!" he said, "for Eadwulf, my brother! He waxes worse, not better." But, as he spoke, a nearer crash of the hounds' music came pealing through the tree-tops, and with a stealthy step he crossed over the summit to the rear of the hillock, where he concealed himself behind the boll of a stupendous oak, making his grayhound lie down in tall fern beside him.
The approaching hounds came to a sudden fault, and silence, deep as that of haunted midnight, fell on the solitary place.
[1 ] Omnia sunt wasta. Modo omnino wasta. Ex maxima parte wasta.—Doomsday Book, vol. i. fol. 309.
[2 ] Duo Taini tenueri. ibi sunt ii villani cum I carruca. valuit xl solidos. modo ilii sol.—Ibid. vol. i. fol. 845.