3 o6 WOLF-HUNTING. 



long as he had followed him, he had never seen the Captain kill a 

 single head of game \ that, day after day, he fired away more 

 powder and shot than any officer at Concarneau, but all in vain ; 

 and that his very dogs had forsaken him, disgusted with his mal- 

 practice. " And I, too," added the Breton, " would have done 

 the same long since, if I had not been well paid for enduring the 

 tantalising sight." This inability, then, on his part, was the sole 

 ground on which he declined to use his gun in our company ; and 

 intensely as he enjoyed the sport of seeing the birds knocked 

 down, his consciousness of being unable himself to add to the bag 

 impelled him altogether to abstain from shooting rather than run 

 the risk of exposing himself to our ridicule. 



On returning towards the Hermitage, as we clambered over a 

 piece of rocky ground forming a kind of crest to an old oak 

 forest that stretched away for miles in the vale below, the setters 

 suddenly came on a wild cat, which, quick as lightning, managed 

 to dodge in and out of the rocks, and finally to take refuge in the 

 trunk of a hollow tree before we could get even a snap-shot at it. 

 Shafto alone had viewed the animal ; and, as it was evidently on 

 a marauding expedition among the conies that frequented these 

 rocks, he did his utmost to induce one of the dogs to enter the 

 tree and bolt the beast from his stronghold. But the dog knew 

 too well the danger of putting his nose into such hot quarters, and 

 prudently kept it outside. Shafto, however, determined not to be 

 beaten, commenced rolling some large stones against the butt of 

 the tree, till he had fairly blocked up every cranny by which the 

 brute could escape. " Now then," said he, puffing and panting 

 under his labour, " methinks he'll keep till morning, when we'll 

 smoke him out or cut down the tree if that won't stir him." 



" And of course you'll shoot him as he bolts," said Keryfan, 

 who was seated on a boulder hard by, quietly smoking his pipe, 

 and marvelling at the strength and adroitness which Shafto had 

 displayed in completing the blockade. "When Ajax, the son 



