Part 21

[Sidenote: =Mayster of Game.= c. +iii.+ fol. 19.]

For the indications of speed, and strength of course, in the hare, see L’Ecole de la Chasse, c. +iv.+ “Lièvre vigoureux, bon à chasser,” &c. “The hare that renneth,” says De Langley, “wt. right stondyng eeres is but litel a ferd and is strong; and zit whan she holdeth that oone eere upryght stondyng and that other y leyde lowe upon her ryge, she fereth but litel the houndes. An hare that crompes hure tayle upon hure rumpe whan she sterteth out of here forme, as a conyng, it is token she is stronge and wele rennyng.”

[Sidenote: De Venat. c. +v.+]

[Sidenote: De Naturâ Animal. L. +xiii.+ c. 14.]

Xenophon enters most fully into the description of the hare, her habits, haunts, &c.—ποδωκέστατοι μὲν οὖν εἰσὶν οἱ ὄρειοι, οἱ πεδινοὶ δὲ ἧττον, βραδύτατοι δὲ οἱ ἕλειοι. And so also Ælian, with some difference as to the speed of the mountain and plain hares—Λαγῲ δὲ ὄρειοι οὐκ οὕτως ταχεῖς ὡσπεροῦν οἱ τοῖς πεδίοις ἐνοικοῦντες, εἰ μή ποτε ἄρα κἀκεῖνοι πεδίον ἔχοιεν ὑποκείμενον, ἐν ᾧ κατίοντες διαθέουσι. See also Polluc. Onomast. L. +v.+ c. +xii.+ and varr. de r. r. l. +iii.+ c. +xii.+ Much of Xenophon’s description is versified by Oppian:

[Sidenote: Cyneget. L. +iii.+ vs. 504.]

πτῶκας ἀείδωμεν, θήρης ἐρίδωρον ὀπώρην σῶμα πέλει τυτθὸν, λάσιον δολιχώτατον οὖας βαιὸν ὕπερθε κάρη, βαιοὶ πόδες, οὐκ ἴσα κῶλα, κ. τ. λ.

[Sidenote: =Mayster of Game.= c. +iii.+ fol. 20.]

“Of hares soom goon faster and ben stronger than other, as of men and of other beestis. And also the pasture and the contre wher thei abiden helpeth moche thereto; ffor whan an hare abideth and formeth in a playn contre ther as no busshes be, suche hares ben comonly strengest and wel rennyng. And also whan thei pasture of too herbes, that oon is clepyd sorpol and that other pulegium, thei be stronge and fast rennyng.”

[Sidenote: C. F. Paullini Lagograph. Curios. S. +iv.+]

[Sidenote: Quadripartit. Botanicum.]

This superiority of the upland over the lowland hare continues, according to Paullini, after death. The flavour of its flesh on the table is as superior in the former to what it is in the latter, as the prowess of the one during life surpassed that of the other—“Lumbi et clunes, seu coxæ,” says the credulous epicure of Eisenach, “gratissimum præbent alimentum et pulmentum, imprimis marium, qui femellis in cibatu meritò præferuntur, præsertim si montium fuerint incolæ planorumque locorum, serpyllo, pulegio, et similibus herbis vescentes. Qui enim in palustribus locis degunt, vilioris conditionis sunt carnis et succi deterioris.” The cause of the inferiority of the latter is furnished by Simon Paulli, “quia illorum intercus et excrementitia humiditas, quæ carnem reddit manu contumacem, non attenuata et consumpta est, uti horum, qui fugati sunt.”

[Sidenote: Book of Venerie p. 248.]

Turberville observes a hare will take to the open country, if the horsemen stand on the covert-side, “then peradventure when shee ryseth, shee will take towards the champayne;” but I have often seen a hare voluntarily start directly away from the covert, without any such obstacle existing to her nearer escape.

[Sidenote: Ælian. de Natur. Animal. L. +xiii.+ c. 14.]

Οὐ μὴν ἀναλίσκει τὴν ἑαυτοῦ δύναμιν ἀταμιεύτως, τηρεῖ δὲ τοῦ διώκοντος τὴν ὁρμήν καὶ ἐὰν μὲν ᾖ νωθὴς, οὐ πάνυ ἀνῆκε τὸ ἑαυτοῦ τάχος ἀλλὰ καί τι καὶ ἀνέστειλεν, ὡς προεκθεῖν μὲν τοῦ κυνὸς, οὐ μὴν ἀπαγορεῦσαι ὑπὸ τοῦ συντόνου τοῦ δρόμου αὐτός. Οἶδε γὰρ ἀμείνων ὢν, καὶ ὁρᾷ εἰς τὸ μὴ ὑπερπονεῖσθαι οἱ τὸν καιρὸν ὄντα. Ἐὰν δὲ καὶ ὁ κύων ᾖ ὤκιστος, τηνικαῦτα ὁ λαγὼς φέρεται θέων ᾗ ποδῶν ἔχει, κ. τ. λ.

Οὐ γάρ τοι ἐπὶ τῷ ἁλῶναι τὸ θηρίον ἐξάγουσι τὰς κύνας, ἀλλὰ ἐς ἀγῶνα δρόμου καὶ ἅμιλλαν κ. τ. λ. With the fine feelings of a genuine courser, the author considers the pleasure of the sport as arising solely from the struggle for victory between the hare and dog;—a trial of the former’s speed, its distinctive excellence, (so elegantly alluded to by Anacreon in his complimentary ode to the ladies,

[Sidenote: Anacreon. Od. +ii.+ 1.]

φύσις κέρατα ταύροις, ὁπλὰς δ’ ἔδωκεν ἵπποις, ποδωκίην λαγωοῖς)

against that of the latter, whose shape marks its natural designation for such a competition. Coursing does not seem to have been otherwise practised as an emulative sport in the classic ages; nor indeed till a very modern period of its annals.

Καὶ καταφυγόντα ἐς ἀκάνθας ἔστιν ὅτε ὀλίγας οἵδε καὶ ἰδόντες ἐπτηχότα κ. τ. λ.—A noble paragraph! conceived and penned in the true spirit of an enlightened sportsman—Read it all ye who dare calumniate, with Savary and Somerville,

[Sidenote: The Chace.]

The mean, murderous, coursing crew, intent On blood and spoil!

Zeune would read διαγωνίσαιτο, as referring to the hare, whose life is spared for having run well. Such a reading, if tenable, (which, I fear, for the reasons given by Schneider, it is not,) would add much to the beauty of the passage.

[Sidenote: De Venat. c. +vi.+]

How different the sentiments of the Bithynian courser from those of the Sciluntian huntsman: like a modern thistle-whipper or pot-hunter, Xenophon bids us search every hiding-place for the worn-out hare, that we may catch her at force, κατὰ πόδας, or drive her into the snares! while Arrian rejoices in her safety and grieves over her accidental capture and destruction.

Ἔπαισα τὴν κεφαλήν. Blane supposes Arrian to strike the greyhound’s head as a chastisement for having killed the hare: but this interpretation is too absurd to be admitted. Many are the examples of the custom of striking the head with the hand, in indication of sudden grief and vexation. Priam is fearfully apprehensive of Hector’s death, and strikes his head with sorrow:

[Sidenote: Iliad. +xxii.+]

————κεφαλήν δ’ ὅγε κόψατο χερσὶν ὕψοσ’ ἀνασχόμενος.

[Sidenote: Herodot. Thalia.]

Psammetichus expresses his grief in the same way over the rich Egyptian monarch, reduced to mendicancy in his old age, ἐπλήξατο τὴν κεφαλὴν—and Plutarch tells us that Solon began παίειν τὴν κεφαλὴν καὶ τ’ ἄλλα ποιεῖν καὶ λέγειν, ἃ συμβαίνει τοῖς περιπαθοῦσι, as soon as he heard of the death of his son.

The joys of the hare-chase have been celebrated, in prose and verse, by the successors of the Athenian, in even higher strains than by himself:

[Sidenote: Natalis Comes de Venat. L. +ii.+]

Tantus amor lepores venandi, gaudia tanta! Hîc mens, hîc animus, hîc est et tota voluntas! Præponunt reliquis una hæc solatia cunctis!

[Sidenote: =Mayster of Game.= fol. 17. 18.]

“The hare is a good lityl beest and moch good sport and lyking is the huntyng of hur more than in eny othere beest that eny man knoweth, &c.” “the sechyns for the hare is a wel faire thing, and the enchasyng of the hare is a wel faire thing, and the sleyng of hym with strength is a faire thing,” &c.

The latter, it is singular, are the very sentiments of Xenophon, reprobated by Arrian; and the passage affords one of many proofs of De Langley’s acquaintance with the Grecian Cynegeticus. See Markham C. C. B. +i.+ p. 33. and Somerville’s Chace.

See Xenophon Cyneg. v. 33. Arrian has spoken throughout his treatise with the greatest respect of his predecessor’s opinions; but ventures to differ from him in this place, as to the feelings which the poor hare, when caught, should excite—

[Sidenote: Sophoclis Ajax. 1011.]

ὦ τῶν ἁπάντων δὴ θεαμάτων ἐμοὶ ἄλγιστον, ὧν προσεῖδον ὀφθαλμοῖς ἐγώ—

and yet he almost immediately palliates Xenophon’s contrary sentiments, and excuses them on account of his ignorance of the Celtic greyhound.

[Sidenote: Clio.]

[Sidenote: C. J. Solini Polyhistor. c. +i.+]

See Herodot. L. +i.+ sect. 85. ὁ δὲ παῖς οὗτος ὁ ἄφωνος, ὡς εἶδε ἐπίοντα τὸν Πέρσην, ὑπὸ δέους τε καὶ κακοῦ ἔῤῥηξε φωνήν εἶπε δὲ, Ὤνθρωπε, μὴ κτεῖνε Κροῖσον. The tale of the father of history is somewhat differently told by Solinus:—Atys, filius regis, mutus ad id locorum, in vocem erupit vi timoris: exclamâsse enim dicitur: “Parce patri meo, Cyre, et hominem te esse, vel casibus disce nostris.”

Xenophon de Venat. c. +vi.+ 9. ἀναβοᾷν εὖγε, εὖγε ὦ κύνες, ἕπεσθε ὦ κύνες. He gives a different cheer at different parts of the chase. Pollux explains the whistling halloo by the significant verb ἐπισίξαι—jubilationibus solitis canes cohortari et feris immittere—

[Sidenote: Ovid. Metam. L. +iii.+]

At comites rabidum solitis hortatibus agmen Ignari instigant.

So Venus in pursuit of her beloved Adonis,

[Sidenote: Ovid. Metam. L. +x.+ 535.]

Per juga, per silvas, dumosaque saxa vagatur Nuda genu, vestem ritu succincta Dianæ; Hortaturque canes, &c.

[Sidenote: Propert. L. +ii.+ El. +xviii.+ ad Cynthiam.]

Incipiam captare feras, et reddere pinu Cornua, et audaces ipse monere canes.

Nemesian approaches nearer to the text, in his probable allusion to the same variety of sound;

[Sidenote: Cyneget. v. 196.]

Necnon consuetæ norint hortamina vocis, Seu cursus revocent, jubeant seu tendere cursus.

But Arrian means more than is expressed in either of these passages: by ὀνομαστὶ ἐπιλέγειν we are to understand speaking to, and cheering the hounds by name; as in the following chapter—εὖγε ὦ Κιῤῥὰ, εὖγε ὦ Βόννα, καλῶς γε ὦ Ὁρμὴ—

ὁ ἀγὼν λαγωῷ καὶ κυνί—accurately and beautifully described in the Ovidian simile;

[Sidenote: Metamorph. L. +i.+ 533.]

Ut canis in vacuo leporem cum Gallicus arvo Vidit; et hic prædam pedibus petit, ille salutem: Alter inhæsuro similis, jam jamque tenere Sperat, et extento stringit vestigia rostro; Alter in ambiguo est, an sit deprensus, et ipsis Morsibus eripitur; tangentiaque ora relinquit.

and in the fable of Cephalus and Procris, the Teumesian fox being substituted for the hare;

[Sidenote: Metamorph. L. +vii.+ 781.]

Tollor eò capioque novi spectacula cursûs: Quà modo deprendi, modo se subducere ab ipso Vulnere visa fera est: nec limite callida recto, In spatiumque fugit; sed decipit ora sequentis, Et redit in gyrum, ne sit suus impetus hosti. Imminet hic sequiturque parem: similisque tenenti Non tenet, et vacuos exercet in aëra morsus.

When reading these and other splendid fables of this poet, and his similes illustrative of terror and rapidity of flight, and eagerness of pursuit, in the parties represented, it strikes us as probable that he was a practical courser, “Apollinis et Dianæ utriusque sectator,” and derived his imagery from experience in the field. To the tales of “Cephalus and his greyhound Lælaps,” and of “Daphne in Laurum” with its cited accompaniment, we may add much of the poetical ornament of Arethusa’s plaintive and terrified flight from the lustful Alpheus,

[Sidenote: Metamorph. L. +v.+ 604.]

Sic ego currebam; sic me ferus ille premebat, ... &c.

in which the classic courser will discover many allusions to his favourite sport:

[Sidenote: Ejusdem v. 609.]

Nec me velocior ille, Sed tolerare diu cursus ego viribus impar Non poteram: longi patiens erat ille laboris. Per tamen et campos, per opertos arbore montes, Saxa quoque et rupes, et quà via nulla, cucurri. Sol erat à tergo: vidi præcedere longam Ante pedes umbram: nisi si timor illa videbat. Sed certè sonituque pedum terrebar; et ingens Crinales vittas afflabat anhelitus oris.

And when the affrighted nymph is rescued by the interposition of a cloud from her pursuer’s grasp, and hears the cry “Io Arethusa, Io Arethusa,” the poet compares her to a hare in a brake under similar terror,

[Sidenote: Ejusdem v. 627.]

Lepori, qui vepre latens hostilia cernit Ora canum, nullosque audet dare corpore motus:

as if the chase of this little animal had supplied him with the outline of his picture.

[Sidenote: De Naturâ Animal. L. +xiii.+ c. 14.]

Ὁ μὲν ἐξελίξας τὸν δρόμον &c. So Ælian, δρόμον δὲ ἕνα καὶ ἰθὺν οὐ θεῖ, δεῦρο δὲ καὶ ἐκεῖσε παρακλίνει, καὶ ἐξελίττει τῇ καὶ τῇ, ἐκπλήττων τοὺς κύνας καὶ ἀπατῶν.

Apollonius Rhodius has well expressed the κύνες δεδαημένοι ἄγρης straining after the game with open jaws;

[Sidenote: Argonaut. L. +ii.+ 280.]

τυτθὸν δὲ τιταινόμενοι μετόπισθεν ἄκρῃς ἐν γενύεσσι μάτην ἀράβησαν ὀδόντας.

and Virgil in the simile of the “vividus Umber;” copying, probably, the poet of the Argonauts,

[Sidenote: Æneid. L. +xii.+ 754.]

Hæret hians, jam jamque tenet, similisque tenenti Increpuit malis, morsuque elusus inani est.

The hare under pursuit has a peculiar sensibility of sounds behind her. To this excellence she owes her preservation from the danger of her pursuers. By this faculty she often outstrips the fleetest brace of greyhounds, attentive to the noise of every stretch, and sound of every pant:

[Sidenote: Statii Theb. L. v. 168.]

Præcipitat suspensa fugam; jam jamque teneri Credit, et elusos audit concurrere morsus.

[Sidenote: The Booke of Venerie. p. 248.]

[Sidenote: Bacon, of Discourse, Essay +xxxii.+]

“It is a gallant sport,” says Turberville, “to see how the hare will turne and wind to save herselfe out of the dogges mouth. So that sometimes even when you thinke that your greyhound doth (as it were) gape to take her, she will turne and cast them a good way behind her: and so saveth herselfe by turning, wrenching, and winding, until she reach some covert and so save her life.” And a far greater than this translator of Fouilloux has remarked: “We see in beasts, that those that are weakest in the course, are yet nimblest in the turne; as it is betwixt the greyhound and the hare.”

Scarce inferior to his poetical predecessor of Venusium, the classic Darcius slips his swift-footed Pterelas after the started hare, in a sketch which places the course before the reader’s eyes:

[Sidenote: Darcii Venusini Canes.]

Ocyus insequitur Pterelas, cursuque citato Intervalla facit lati decrescere campi. Jam propior propiorque micat, jam captat hianti Summa pedum rostro, jam terga fugacia stringit. Ille pavet, flexoque obliquat tramite cursus, Et dubiâ trepidans formidine, jamque teneri Se putat, et rursùm tangentis ab ore recedit, Fataque momento sibi prorogat, æmula donec Rostra levis mergat miserando in corpore victor, Fulmineus victor, gemino cui tramite lumbos Spina subit graciles, et castigata coercet Ilia substrictus venter, stant crura volantem Præteritura notum, longo internodia ductu Pes gerit, in cœlum tolluntur acumine bino Auriculæ, flexoque in lævia tergora gyro Erectæ redeunt falcata volumina caudæ.

Mr. Gay’s “Rural Sports,” Canto 2nd, afford the only poetical description of a hare-course in the English language, with which I am acquainted, in addition to that already cited from the Polyolbion of Michael Drayton:

[Sidenote: Canto +ii.+ v. 289.]

Yet if for sylvan spurts thy bosom glow, Let thy fleet greyhound urge his flying foe. With what delight the rapid course I view! How does my eye the circling race pursue! He snaps deceitful air with empty jaws, The subtle hare darts swift beneath his paws: She flies, he stretches: now with nimble bound Eager he presses on, but overshoots his ground: She turns, he winds, and soon regains the way, Then tears with gory mouth the screaming prey.

Οἱ φελλεῶνες. I have not met with this word elsewhere. Xenophon has τὰ φέλλια, chap. +v.+ De Ven., to signify the same kind of stony ground. The Scholia on the Acharnenses of Aristophanes, Act +ii.+ sc. +ii.+ explains φελλεὺς as rocky ground, stony beneath, with a superficial covering of earth—such as we see on the slopes of hills, perhaps. Φελλὸς occurs in Hesychius: σκληρὸς τόπος καὶ δυσεργὴς, καὶ ἐξ ἐπιπολῆς πετρώδης. Possibly the English term “fell” may be derived from the Greek φελλὸς or φελλεύς.

[Sidenote: Xenophon. de Venat. c. +v.+]

Πόδας τοὺς πρόσθεν ἄκρως ὑγροὺς, στενοὺς, ὀρθούς τοὺς δὲ ὄπισθεν στερεοὺς, πλατεῖς πάντας δὲ οὐδενὸς τραχέος φροντίζοντας.

[Sidenote: Ælian. de Nat. Animal. L. +xiii.+ 14.]

[Sidenote: Franc. Junii Etymol. Anglican. à Lye. 1743.]

Πέφυκε γὰρ δασὺς τοὺς πόδας καὶ δὴ καὶ τῶν τραχέων ἀνέχεται. The term δασύπους is evidently derived from the woolly covering of the hare’s feet; originally an adjective expressive of this peculiarity, but subsequently used to designate the hare herself. To the same origin Junius refers the English term rabbet—“cuniculus:” “Quotquot unquam observarunt Anglos, in linguæ vernaculæ pronuntiatione, o sonare ut a, facilè mecum credent olim fuisse robbet, quod nunc rabbet pronuntiant et scribunt. Atque ita robbet illud fortasse corruptum fuerint ex roughfet, quod exprimit Gr. δασύπους.”

The English word hare is derived by the same Etymologist from the Anglo-Saxon hara. “A. S. hara videtur esse ab hær, pilus; quoniam, ut est apud Plinium, ‘villosissimum animalium lepus.’”

Let him be made to feel in the words of Ovid,

non tam Turpe fuit vinci, quàm contendisse decorum.

It is a great point to encourage a young hound, whether he kill or not.

Plutarch remarks in his treatise on the Comparative Instinct of Land and Water Animals, that the Canes Venatici, generally, tear their game and lick up the blood greedily, when they kill it themselves; but if the animal, of which they are in pursuit, expire from exhaustion, before they reach it, they merely wag their tails, and do not lacerate it; showing thereby that the contest was not for the flesh of the animal, but rather for the glory of victory.

Κιῤῥὰ—derived probably from the red colour of the dog.

Βόννα—the derivation of this canine name is unknown to me.

Ὁρμὴ—Arrian’s own much-valued hound: to the same kennel perhaps belonged Cirras and Bonnas.

[Sidenote: Ælian. de Nat. Animal. L. +viii.+ c. +ii.+]

ἔοικε δὲ ἔχειν τι καὶ φιλοτιμίας ἐν ἑαυτῷ φυσικῆς μὴ γὰρ δεῖσθαι κρεῶν, ἀλλὰ νίκης ἐρᾷν.

“Trahimur omnes laudis studio,” says Cicero, “et optimus quisque maximè glorià ducitur.”

Pliny also makes the same remark, “Canes à cursu volutatio juvat, ut veterina à jugo.”

In the Paris edition of 1644, in Blancard’s of 1683, and in Zeune’s, this Chapter stands after Chap. +xiv.+; but, on the authority of Schneider, it is more appropriately introduced in this place. Indeed the present, and two following chapters, treat of the different modes of coursing among the Celts, and might all be united under one title.

Ὅσοι μὲν πλουτοῦσιν αὐτῶν καὶ τρυφῶσιν—the superior class of Celtic gentry, nobility, &c.

[Sidenote: Encyc. Méthod. Les Chasses. p. 439.]

Τοὺς κατοπτεύσοντας—finders to look over, &c. The French say, “aller à la vue.”—“c’est découvrir s’il y a dans le pays des bêtes courables.”

[Sidenote: De Venat. c. +v.+ 10.]

Ἀναπαυόμενος λαγώς. No description can surpass in accuracy and elegance that of the hare in her form by the elder Xenophon: Κατακλίνεται δὲ ὑποθεὶς τὰ ὑποκώλια ὑπὸ τὰς λαγόνας, τὰ δὲ πρόσθεν σκέλη τὰ πλεῖστα συνθεὶς καὶ ἐκτείνας, ἐπ’ ἄκρους δὲ τοὺς πόδας τὴν γένυν καταθεὶς, τὰ δὲ ὦτα ἐπιπετάσας ἐπὶ τὰς ὠμοπλάτας εἶτα δὲ ὑποστέγει τὰ ὑγρά ἔχει δὲ καὶ τὴν τρίχα στεγανήν πυκνὴ γὰρ καὶ μαλακή.

The example of the Celtic nobility of Arrian’s days was followed by those of a later date. Bruyerinus relates (de Re Cib. c. 24.) “Gallia omnis leporibus scatet, ideoque horum venatio peculiaris est mediocri nobilitati et primariæ non invisa.” And Baptista Guarinus notes of the Veronese territory, that it abounds with hares, and affords opportunities for long courses:

Namque hic si studeas lepores agitare fugaces, Cursibus effusis æquora longa patent.

[Sidenote: Schediasm. L. +v.+ c. +xvi.+]

[Sidenote: Cyneg. +i.+ v. 148.]

Αὐτουργοὶ κυνηγεσίων. Upon this expression Henry Stephens merely remarks, “quod loquendi genus observatione dignum est,”—offering no explanation: Zeune interprets “qui pedites venantur, studio rei capti:” Holsten, “qui ipsi per se venationis studio incumbunt:”—those who have to do with the practical part of the sport, as the slippers, leaders of the hounds, &c. the actual workmen. Such were the ἐργοπόνοι κρατεροὶ of Oppian, the bearers of the hunting gear to the covert, &c.

[Sidenote: Turberville’s Booke of Hunting, &c.]

Ἐκπεριΐασι δὲ ἐπὶ μετώπου ταχθέντες. We here see the military tactician: after the lapse of nearly seventeen centuries, no improvement has taken place in the mode of beating for a hare. One of our best English manuals of coursing, whose author was probably as expert in the field as his predecessor of Bithynia, thus describes the plan adopted in the days of good Queen Bess: “To course ye. hare you must send either hare-finders before you to find some hare sitting, or els yourself wh. your company may range and beat over the fields until you either find a hare sitting, or start her. I have marked ye. hare-finders in their seeking of a hare in Northamptonshyre, and they will never beat but one end of a furlong: and that shall be the end which is downe the wind or from the wind; for they hold opinion that a hare will not (by her wil) sit with her head into the wind. He that will seeke a hare must go overthwart the lands; and every land that he passeth over, let him beginne with his eye at his foot, and so looke downe the land to the furlong’s end, first on the one side and then on the other; and so shall he find ye. hare sitting in her forme: assoone as he espyeth her he must cry Sa how. Then they which lead the greyhounds may come neare: and you may appoynt which greyhounds shall course. Then let him which found the hare, go towards her and say, Up, pusse, up! untill she rise out of her forme.”

Ἄρχοντα—“the judge expert in coursing” of Turberville, p. 249.

It appears to me from this passage that the Celts coursed with each hound held in a single slip and collar, and started probably simultaneously with his appointed compeer, held in juxta-position by a second person. Some commentators, however, are of opinion, from the term συνδυαζέτω, that the dogs were held in double collars, or couples; but if so, we must still suppose, from the words σὺ καὶ σὺ ἐπιλύειν, that two persons were appointed to let the dogs loose at the same time: