Bestowed prerogatives of the nobility.
The Paris edition of the Herald printed the lamentable tale on its
front page and I clipped the account. I offer it here in exact
reproduction, including the headline:
HUNTING INCIDENT SAID TO BE DUE TO CONSPIRACY
Further details are given in this morning's Figaro of the incident
between Prince Murat and M. Dauchis, the mayor of Saint-Felix,
near Clermont, which was briefly reported in yesterday's Herald.
A regular conspiracy was organized by M. Dauchis, it is alleged,
in order to secure the stag Prince Murat and Comte de Valon were
hunting in the forest of La Neuville-en-Hetz. Already, at the
outset of the hunt, M. Dauchis, according to Le Figaro, charged
at a huntsman with a little automobile in which he was driving and
threatened to fire. Then when the stag ran into the wood, near
the Trye River, one of his keepers shot it. In great haste the
animal was loaded on another automobile; and before either the
prince or Comte de Valon could interfere it was driven away.
While Comte de Valon spurred his horse in pursuit Prince Murat
disarmed the man who had shot the stag, for he was leveling his
gun at another huntsman; but before the gun was wrenched from his
hands he had struck Prince d'Essling, Prince Murat's uncle, across
the face with the butt.
Meantime Comte de Valon had overtaken the automobile and, though
threatened with revolvers by its occupants, would have recaptured
the stag if the men in charge of it had not taken it into the house
of M. Dauchis' father.
The only course left for Prince Murat and Comte de Valon was to
lodge a complaint with the police for assault and for killing the
stag, which M. Dauchis refused to give back.
From this you may see how very much more exciting stag hunting is
in France than in America. Comparing the two systems we find but
one point of resemblance - namely, the attempted shooting of a
huntsman. In the North Woods we do a good deal of that sort of
thing: however with us it is not yet customary to charge the
prospective victim in a little automobile - that may come in time.
Our best bags are made by the stalking or still-hunting method.
Our city-raised sportsman slips up on his guide and pots him from
a rest.
But consider the rest of the description so graphically set forth
by Le Figaro - the intriguing of the mayor; the opposing groups
rampaging round, some on horseback and some in automobile runabouts;
the intense disappointment of the highborn Prince Murat and his
uncle, the Prince d'Essling, and his friend, the Comte de Valon;
the implied grief of the stag at being stricken down by other than
noble hands; the action of the base-born commoner, who shot the
stag, in striking the Prince d'Essling across his pained and
aristocratic face with the butt - exact type of butt and name of
owner not being given.
