THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 287 



and water at hand — that ahnost natural element 

 to which, for refuge, they are wont to fiy. 



It was a rare apprenticeship for him, that 

 time with the otter-hounds ; every kill develop- 

 ing fresh dodges, and qualifying him in after 

 years to solve those most puzzling of all prob- 

 lems in the Art of Venerie — the wiles of a deer 

 when he comes to " soil." It is a fact known 

 to all followers of that noble sport, that, short 

 of diving, a deer will take as much advantage 

 of water as an otter does ; wading and swim- 

 ming for a mile or two, sinking himself to his 

 nostrils, with the topmost tine of his antlers 

 effectually submerged, and often quitting the 

 stream at one point to return to it at another. 

 " It not unfrequently happens," says Mr. Collyns, 

 " that the cunning animal has merely ' soiled ' 

 when he entered the stream and then backed 

 it on his foil, and laid fast in the covert." 



Mr. Whyte-Melville, too, in " Katerfelto," 

 describes the famous harbourer, Red Rube, as 

 being utterly perplexed by what a deer may do 

 when forced to its last move at the end of a 

 chase: "Who shall say that all this calculation, 

 this strategy, this reflection, is so far below 

 reason to be called instinct ? Even Red Rube, 

 many a mile behind on his pony, taxing his 

 resources of intellect and cunning, backed by 

 the observation of fifty years, that he may 

 arrive somehow at the finish in time to hear 



