Sighing, moaning, whistling, screaming--now in fitful gusts, then in one solid sweep, mighty nature’s breath snaps the tree top and rends up the gnarled roots of a century’s growth. On, on, he goes. Bough, branch, twig, and leaf--clinging like affection to the dead--he whirls and scatters in his stormy path, and with mad delight flings destruction in his wake. O-ho for the wind. Away, o’er heath and waste, and through dark and deep woods, and by lone churchyards, humming through ivy-twined belfries, and jarring rickety casements, shaking old hinges, and ripping up thatched eaves and roofs, he holds his course, like a fiery unchecked steed. O-ho for the wind. Breasting the wave, he drives the surge high, and higher yet. Rolling mountains, topped with white and hissing foam, duck from cresting clouds to the wide chasms below. O-ho for the wind--death to others is fun to him. A ship! Boldly she braves his mighty thrust. Again. With one fell swoop, and, quivering, down to the depths she sinks. O-ho for the wind. It was late in the day, and darkness began to drop around before there were any symptoms of my companions’ return. At length I heard the welcome clink of the horses’ feet along the gravel road leading to the kennel, and shortly afterwards old Mark threw open the door, and in they trotted. “Well,” said I, as Trimbush entered “what sport?” “Oh!” replied he, “none at all. Such a wind as this,” continued he, “is as bad as a blind fog or a hard frost; for the result is just the same. We can do nothing with a fox while it lasts.” “I didn’t think of that,” rejoined I, “or I should not have been so envious of ye all day.” “Might as well have been at home,” returned the old hound, in a grumbling humour. “You found?” said I. “Of course we did,” he replied. “We never get a blank day. They are too staunch and true preservers in _our_ country for that to take place.” My companion was now called to take his turn in the warm bath, which Mark had prepared, and after his body and limbs were well laved, he was ordered into the lodging-room, where there was plenty of clean straw to roll in. “There’s nothing like this,” said Trimbush, rubbing his back, with all his feet in the air. “There’s nothing like this,” repeated he, “after a cold, wretched day. It warms one’s blood, prevents rheumatism, and is a real blessed preventative to many disorders. I like my bath as well as my meal.” “You are no bad judge,” replied I, laughing. “I should say not,” returned he. “I should say that I was anything but a bad judge between what’s good for us and what is not.”