wood near which I subsequently had the honour to meet the
venerable chief eunuch and the most illustrious grand huntsman.
I noticed the track of an animal in the sand, and it was easy to
see that it was that of a small dog. Long faint streaks upon the
little elevations of sand between the footmarks convinced me
that it was a she dog with pendent dugs, showing that she must
have had puppies not many days since. Other scrapings of the
sand, which always lay close to the marks of the forepaws,
indicated that she had very long ears; and, as the imprint of
one foot was always fainter than those of the other three, I
judged that the lady dog of our august Queen was, if I may
venture to say so, a little lame.

"'With respect to the horse of the King of Kings, permit me to
observe that, wandering through the paths which traverse the
wood, I noticed the marks of horse-shoes. They were all
equidistant. "Ah!" said I, "this is a famous galloper." In a
narrow alley, only seven feet wide, the dust upon the trunks of
the trees was a little disturbed at three feet and a half from
the middle of the path. "This horse," said I to myself, "had a
tail three feet and a half long, and, lashing it from one side
to the other, he has swept away the dust." Branches of the trees
met overhead at the height of five feet, and under them I saw
newly fallen leaves; so I knew that the horse had brushed some
of the branches, and was therefore five feet high. As to his
bit, it must have been made of twenty-three carat gold, for he
had rubbed it against a stone, which turned out to be a
touchstone, with the properties of which I am familiar by
experiment. Lastly, by the marks which his shoes left upon
pebbles of another kind, I was led to think that his shoes were