142 OTTER HUNTING, FALCONRY, SHOOTING 



"October 20th, 1887. 

 " I never enjoyed flighting in perfection except in 

 Epirus and Tunis. Imagine, after a good day with the 

 woodcocks, wading into water knee-deep ; birds around, 

 mallard, gadwall, shoveller, teal, pintail, wigeon, pochard, 

 tufters, golden-eye, with eagle owl booing from rocks close 

 by, bitterns almost brushing one's face, snipe ' scaping ' in 

 every direction, and woodcock flipping round like bats. 



" A neighbour of ours found an old hare, in a 

 neat and well-used form in his strawberry bed. His 

 garden was walled on three sides, to a height of perhaps 

 fourteen feet, and on the fourth side to about three 

 feet, with a drop on the outside of some five feet or 

 more to a little stream, the opposite bank of which 

 was about level with the foot of a low wall, and quite 

 four feet from it at the narrowest part. At one end 

 of this low wall was a little latched gate, opening upon 

 a plank bridge over the stream. My friend, on first 

 finding the hare amongst his strawberries, called a 

 garden lad, posted himself at the gate, and told the 

 boy to put the hare up. She came leisurely up to the 

 little gate, but, on finding my friend there, turned, and 

 tried the low wall in several places. On the approach 

 of the boy, she at last jumped on to the wall, and tumbled 

 headlong into the stream, in which there were only a tew 

 inches of water. She scuttled along the bottom, and 

 disappeared. The next afternoon she was again in her 

 form, and, on being touched with a stick, hopped off 



