Hound

Whosoever loveth me loveth my hound.
—Hugh Latimer

A gentle hound should never play the cur.
—John Skelton

A hound is a type of hunting dog used by hunters to track or chase prey.

Quotes

• His hounds they lie down at his feet,
  So well they can their master keep.
  • Anonymous, "The Three Ravens"

• And through the woods, another way,
  Faint bugle-notes from far are borne,
  Where hunters gather, staghounds bay,
  Round some old forest-lodge at morn.
  • Matthew Arnold, "Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse", in Fraser’s Magazine (1855)

• A good Hound never barks on a cold trail.
  • Thornton Burgess, Bowser the Hound (1920), Ch. XIX

• The great slow-hounds, their throats did set a base;
  The fleet swift hounds, as tenors next in place;
  The little beagles did a trebble sing,
  And through the air their voices round did ring,
  Which made such consort as they ran along,
  That, had they spoken words, ’t had been a song.
  • Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, "The Hunting of the Hare", in Poems and Fancies (1653)

• And still I like to fancy that,
    Somewhere beyond the Styx’s bound,
  Sir Guy’s tall phantom stoops to pat
    His little phantom hound!
  • Patrick R. Chalmers, "Hold", in Punch (1 September 1909), p. 152

• four lean hounds crouched low and smiling
  my heart fell dead before.
  • E. E. Cummings, "All in green went my love riding", in Tulips and Chimneys (1923)

• They were the footprints of a gigantic hound!
  • Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles (1904), Ch. 2

• A hound it was, an enormous coal-black hound, but not such a hound as mortal eyes have ever seen. Fire burst from its open mouth, its eyes glowed with a smouldering glare, its muzzle and hackles and dewlap were outlined in flickering flame. Never in the delirious dream of a disordered brain could anything more savage, more appalling, more hellish be conceived than that dark form and savage face which broke upon us out of the wall of fog.
  • Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles (1904), Ch. 14

• Ten brace, and more, of greyhounds, snowy fair,
  And tall as stags, ran loose, and coursed around his chair,
  A match for pards in flight, in grappling for the bear.
  With golden muzzles all their mouths were bound,
  And collars of the same their necks surround.
  • John Dryden, Palamon and Arcite (1700), translating Chaucer's Knight's Tale

• And first the dame came rushing through the wood,
  And next the famished hounds that sought their food,
  And griped her flanks, and oft essayed their jaws in blood.
  Last came the felon, on the sable steed,
  Armed with his naked sword, and urged his dogs to speed.
  • John Dryden, Theodore and Honoria (1700), translating one of Boccaccio's tales

• In dreams I see them spring to greet,
    With rapture more than tail can tell,
  Their master of the silent feet
    Who whistles o’er the asphodel,
  And through the dim Elysian bounds
  Leads all his cry of little hounds.
  • George Forrester Scott (alias John Halsham), "My Last Terrier", st. 6

• Though Man, for centuries of care,
  Has taught the Hound to hunt the Hare,
  It's not a natural pursuit,
  For each was born a kindly brute.
  • A. P. Herbert, Silver Stream (1962)

• Whosoever loveth me loveth my hound.
  • Hugh Latimer, Fruitfull Sermons (1635), p. 126

• The hindmost hound oft takes the doubling hare.
  • Francis Quarles, Divine Emblems (1635)

• I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,
  Straining upon the start. The game’s afoot:
  Follow your spirit, and, upon this charge
  Cry ‘God for Harry, England, and Saint George!’
  • William Shakespeare, Henry V, III, i, speech of the King to his soldiers before Harfleur

• O, when mine eyes did see Olivia first,
  Methought she purg’d the air of pestilence;
  That instant was I turn’d into a hart,
  And my desires, like fell and cruel hounds,
  E’er since pursue me.
  • William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, I, i, Duke

• A gentle hound should never play the cur.
  • John Skelton, Garlande of Laurell (1523)

• O, where doth faithful Gêlert roam,
    The flower of all his race,
  So true, so brave,—a lamb at home,
    A lion in the chase?
  • William Robert Spencer, "Beth Gêlert; or, The Grave of the Greyhound", st. 2

• Hound is hungry, hare is fearful.
  • J. R. R. Tolkien, The Two Towers (1954), Treebeard

• An hounde is trewe to his lord or to his maystere and of good love or verrey, an hounde is of greet undirstondyng and of greet knowynge, a hound [is of] greet strength and grete bounte, an hounde is a wise beest and a kynde, an hounde hath greet mynde and greet smellyng, an hounde hath grete bisynesse and greet myght, an hounde is of greet wurthynes and of greet sotilte, a hound [is of greet] lightnesse and of greet pur[s]ueaunce, an hounde is of good obeysaunce, for he wil lerne as a man al that a man wil teche hym, a hounde is ful of good sport.
  • Edward of Norwich, 2nd Duke of York, The Mayster of the Game (1406–13), Ch. XII

Proverbs

• The hindmost hound may catch the hare.
  • James Howell, English Proverbs (1659)

• The foremost hound grips the hare.
  • James Kelly, Scottish Proverbs (1721)

• Every hound is a pup until he hunts.
  • Irish proverb, reported in S. G. Champion, Racial Proverbs (1938), p. 54