Teobaldo rode in advance of all. His steed, swifter by nature or more
severely goaded than those of the retainers, followed so close to the
quarry that twice or thrice the baron, dropping his bridle upon the neck
of the fiery courser, had stood up in his stirrups and drawn the bow to
his shoulder to wound his prey. But the boar, whom he saw only at
intervals among the tangled thickets, would again vanish from view to
reappear just out of reach of the arrow.
So he pursued the chase hour after hour, traversing the ravines of the
valley and the stony bed of the stream, until, plunging into a deep
forest, he lost his way in its shadowy defiles, his eyes ever fixed on
the coveted game he constantly expected to overtake, only to find
himself constantly mocked by its marvellous agility.