I was going down towards the pasture when I heard a very distressing noise,—
O-o-o-o-o!
“This is an English landscape,” said I to myself. “How much more lovely it is than castles, abbeys, and tombs!” and I was trying to think of some poetry, such as Frank would have quoted, when I heard that alarming sound again,—
O-o-o-o-o!
I noticed that one of the fine animals had separated himself from the rest of the herd by the shady brook, and was coming out to meet me, looking very important. Presently he put down his head, gave the earth a scrape with his foot, and then came jumping towards me, bounding and plunging over the hillocks, like a ship on a heavy sea.
I turned right around, just as I did when I saw the bear, and I remembered that Master Lewis might not like to have me venture too far in my first hunting expedition.
I ran! didn’t I run? I soon heard the same deep sound again, “nearer, clearer, deadlier than before,” as the reading book says.
I had almost regained the top of the hill, when the animal bellowed almost right behind me. There was a tree close by, and I went up. It was just as easy for me to climb it as though it had been a ladder.
The animal bounded up the hill, and stood under the tree, pawing the earth and making the same hollow noise.