stink, so that it was sold for two louis; and though burned to ashes, the cinders were obliged, by order of a commissary, to be buried without the town walls. We came up very well in time; for the beast would doubtless have destroyed some one, had it not espied three of us advancing with guns. It certainly jumped through the chaise to get away from us.' These accounts appear to have been received with some incredulity abroad. In the same number of _Lloyd's Evening Post_ that contains the plan of Lord Byron's trial there occurs the following passage about this curious wild beast: 'One of the Dutch Gazetteers by Monday's mail says:--"The accounts of the wild beast seen in the Gévaudan are of such a nature that it is hardly possible to give any credit thereto, and yet most of them have appeared in the _Paris Gazette_, a paper whose authors, known to be men of letters, are too judicious to be suspected of credulity, too prudent, too well informed of what passes at the Court of the King their master, one should think, to attribute to his Most Christian Majesty a reward for an action which never had any existence--an action which was only a fable."' This is, no doubt, an allusion to the reward of 400 livres bestowed upon the boys who beat off the ferocious monster. While the interest and excitement about this terrible wild beast was at the highest, the _St. James's Chronicle_ published an engraving and description of it. The _St. James's Chronicle; or the British Evening Post_, was a folio of four pages, published three times a-week, price twopence-halfpenny. In the number for June 6, 1765, there is printed the following description and woodcut:-- 'For the _St. James's Chronicle_. 'Of this beast, which has already devoured upwards of seventy Persons and spread Terrour and Desolation throughout the whole Gévaudan, the Sieur de la Chaumette, who lately wounded it, has given us the following Description. It is larger than a Calf of a year old, strongly made before, and turned like a Grayhound behind. His Nose is long and pointed, his Ears upright and smaller than a wolf's, his Mouth of a most enormous size, and always wide open; a Streak of Black runs from his Shoulders to the Beginning of his Tail. His Paws are very large and strong; the Hair on his Back and Mane thick, bristly, and erect; his Tail long and terminating in a Bush, like that of a Lion; his Eyes small, fierce, and fiery. From this description it appears that he is neither a Wolf, Tiger, nor Hyena, but probably a Mongrel, generated between the two last, and forming, as it were, a new Species. All the accounts lately received agree in assuring that there are several of them.' [Illustration: STRANGE WILD BEAST SEEN IN FRANCE. FROM THE 'ST. JAMES'S CHRONICLE,' 1765.]