When Ravenswood, who followed a short pace behind his friend, saw that
the stag had fallen, his temporary ardour for the chase gave way to that
feeling of reluctance which he endured at encountering in his fallen
fortunes the gaze whether of equals or inferiors. He reined up his horse
on the top of a gentle eminence, from which he observed the busy and gay
scene beneath him, and heard the whoops of the huntsmen, gaily mingled
with the cry of the dogs, and the neighing and trampling of the horses.
But these jovial sounds fell sadly on the ear of the ruined nobleman.
The chase, with all its train of excitations, has ever since feudal
times been accounted the almost exclusive privilege of the aristocracy,
and was anciently their chief employment in times of peace. The sense
that he was excluded by his situation from enjoying the silvan sport,
which his rank assigned to him as a special prerogative, and the feeling
that new men were now exercising it over the downs which had been
jealously reserved by his ancestors for their own amusement, while he,
the heir of the domain, was fain to hold himself at a distance from
their party, awakened reflections calculated to depress deeply a mind
like Ravenswood's, which was naturally contemplative and melancholy.
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