IN introducing to the reader's notice the Canes Venatici of the following monograph-wherein the embellishment of fable is often admitted as the language of truth, and amusement is paramount to instruction—it must not be expected that I should carry back the history of the chase to the early period of the world's annals, when harmony, and family accord, Were driven from Paradise; and man's subject creatures revolted from their revolted lord καὶ θῆρες αἰδοῦς ἀγνοήσαντες νόμους, ὡς δυσμενῆ φεύγουσι τὸν πρὶν δεσπότην Cowper's Task. B. VI. Phil. de Animal. Propriet. vs. 8. Agrippa de Incert. et Van. Sc. et Art. C. LXXII. De Invent. the probable date of its institution—(" cum peccato enim animalium noxa simul et persecutio et fuga subintravit, et artes venationum excogitatæ sunt,")-nor to the later epoch of its Phenician origin, maintained by Polydore Vergil on the authority of Eusebius; nor Rerum. L. III. its more fabulous Theban birth and distribution, the thrice-told tale of John of Salisbury: 1 but rather consider hunting as an art of acquisition and self-defence of remote and undefined antiquity. C. V. Euseb. de Præp. Evang. L. I. 1. To Henricus Cornelius Agrippa, and his Origin of the Chase, reference is elsewhere given. Identical with his view of its rise, progress, and demerit, is that of Joannes Sarisberiensis, in his Policraticus, De Venaticâ et autoribus et speciebus ejus, et exercitio licito et illicito. "Et primi quidem Thebani," says John, (who wrote P. A. Bargai de Aucupio L. I. p. 13. Oppian. Cyneg. Gratii Cyneget. vs. 2. On Venation, as a pastime, too much has already been said in the preface to Arrian: and I will at present confine my remarks to a few classical anecdotes of its primitive furniture, its founders, and progressional improvement; premising, by the way, that when men were unacquainted with the blessings of civilization, and had no idea of pleasure beyond the gratification of their appetites-when, in short, they were in a state of nature-hunting was not the bywork of leisure hours, but the call of continual urgency-not the jocund diversion of a day, but the toilsome and perilous occupation of a life. In such early times, the nonage of a fallen world, commenced the war of men with beasts: Cœpêre in pecudes avidi sævire ferasque, The personal safety of himself and those dependent on his protection, and the daily cravings of hunger, dictated to man the necessity of animal slaughter; so that, in seeking his quotidian meal, he originated the art of hunting : ἐπιδόρπιον εὕρατο θήρην. Rude arts at first, but witty want refined The huntsman's wiles, and famine form'd the mind. The first hostile efforts of the barbarian lords of creation against their biped and quadruped subjects, "joint-tenants of the shade" with themselves, were confined, we may suppose, to manifestations of physical strength and brute courage; by which, under the powerful incentives of self-interest, they procured the vital necessaries of food and clothing: priùs omnis in armis ! Spes fuit, et nudà silvas virtute movebant De Nugis Curialium L. I. c. IV. in the reign of our second Henry, and from whom later authors have purloined the oft-repeated reprobation,)" si fidem sequamur historiæ, eam communicandam omnibus statuerunt. Et ex quo suspecta sit omnibus gens fœda parricidiis, incestibus detestanda, insignis fraude, nota perjuriis, hujus artificii, vel potiùs maleficii, in primis præcepta congessit, quæ postmodum ad gentem mollem imbellemque, levem et impudicam (Phrygios loquor) transmitteret," &c. 1. Armis from armi not arma. Wase's version is wrong. The term is more com L. IV. 699. And here at the head of rude pedestrian sportsmen we find the human inventor of the science of the chase, that legendary personage, the Gorgon-killing Perseus1" Gorgonis anguicoma Perseus supe- Ovid. Metam. rator" (for I would not deprive Latona's hunting-twins, Apollo and Diana, nor the worshipful race of Centaurs, pūla Onpoμiyñ,2 Xen. de Venat. of their priority of claim, and patent of precedency, in the apotheosis of the chase,) who, when he had performed this redoubted act of courage, as we are told by the poet of Anazarbus : ποδῶν κραιπνοῖσιν ἀειρόμενος πτερύγεσσι καὶ πτῶκας, καὶ θῶας ἐλάζυτο, καὶ γένος αἰγῶν ἠδ ̓ αὐτῶν ἐλάφων στικτῶν αἰπεινὰ κάρηνα. As men in general, however, did not possess the speed of Perseus C I. Oppian. Cyneg. Oppian. Cyneg. L. II. 10. monly applied to the shoulder or arm of animals than man: but the sense of the passage requires the interpretation I have put upon it, and is farther illustrated by the "unguibus et pugnis" of Horace, and "meræ vires" of Ovid: Tum genus humanum solis errabat in agris ; Hisque meræ vires, et rude corpus erat. Politian elegantly exemplifies the Faliscian's meaning in his Silva, entitled Nutricia; Sed longum tamen obscuris immersa tenebris Gens rudis, atque inculta virûm, sine more, sine ullâ Lege propagabant ævum, passimque ferino Degebant homines ritu, visque insita cordi Mole obsessa gravi, nondùm ullos prompserat usus, Nil animo, duris agitabant cuncta lacertis. 1. For Perseus's title to this post of honour Oppian is my only voucher; but his words are decisive: ἐν μερόπεσσι δὲ πρῶτος ὁ Γοργόνος αὐχέν ̓ ἀμέρσας, 2. Will the reader admit the explanation of the Policraticus as to the fabulous connexion of these hybrids with the chase: "nempe qui his studiis aut desidiis insistunt, semiferi sunt, et abjectâ potiore humanitatis parte, ratione morum prodigiis conformantur?" and again, "Venatores omnes adhuc institutionem redolent Centaurorum. Rarò invenitur quisquam eorum modestus aut gravis," &c. Hor. Sat. L. 1. S. III. vs. 101. Ovid. Art. Am. L. II. Carmina V. Illustr. Poet. p. 159. Cyneg. L. II. vs. 8. J. Sarisberiensis de N. C. L. I. c. IV. Education of Achilles. Bedingfield's and Achilles, 1 "To sweep with winged feet along the level plain;" nor the power of catching at force, vóop, ķvvodpoμíns, Callimach. H. the fleetest animals of chase, like the goddess Dian; it became necessary to add to their naked powers sundry inartificial implements, auxiliary to the subjugation of some, the destruction and expulsion of other beasts. in Dian. 105. Lucretii L. v. 964. Somerville's Gratii Cyneg. vs. 5. Et manuum mirà freti virtute pedumque New and unpolish'd was the huntsman's art; Unheard before; surpriz'd, alas! to find Man now their foe, whom erst they deem'd their lord, Secure they graz’d. Acquiring knowledge by experience, man advanced in the mechanism and variety of his hunting gear, as in other articles of increasing civilization. Post alià propiore vià, meliùsque profecti, The Times. Pind. Nem. Carm. L. 111. 85. 1. "The light-footed Greek of Chiron's school," as Churchill calls him. τὸν ἐθάμβεεν Αρτεμίς τε καὶ θρασείο Αθάνα, Κτείνοντ ̓ ἐλάφους ἄνευ κυ νῶν δολίων θ ̓ ἑρκέων· ποσσὶ γὰρ κράτεσκεν. |