What does Reeves mean by the line "he bounds to his feet and snuffs and sniffs"?

You have asked about the
twelfth line of the poem called "The Sea," written by James Reeves, a
twentieth-century British writer.In this poem, the speaker compares the sea to a "hungry
dog" that rolls on the beach and gnaws at the stones, moaning and licking his paws.In the
second stanza, the speaker describes the sea at night, how the sea "bounds to his feet and
snuffs and sniffs," shaking wet all over the cliffs and howling loudly.In other words,
then, it seems as though the sea becomes more wild at night.During the day, the "dog"
of the sea stays upon the beach and performs small actions, but, at night, the dog becomes quite
unruly, the waves coming in taller and louder, smashing into the cliff bottoms and spraying
their sides.To say that the dog bounds to his feet seems to reference the increased height of
the waves, and he "snuffs and sniffs" making loud and varied sounds as those waves
crash against the cliffs.