310 DRAWING FOR A DEER. ' 



tangled forest on the banks of the river, and anything half 

 so severe for horse or hound I never saw. The growth of 

 wild vines and a sort of briar covered with thorns, were 

 strong as ropes, and would hold a horse, while the up 

 rooted trees, cast in all directions, and grown over by 

 creepers, were imper viable to a hound, and impossible in 

 regard to any fast pace. The banks of the wide river, 

 too, for a vast extent, as well as in many places, were so 

 steep and high, that if a hound went down to drink it 

 was impossible, for hundreds of yards, for him to get 

 out again. 



Having drawn a considerable distance, and seen the slot 

 of a deer, Druid at last became curious, and ran his nose 

 along the twigs in his path that might have brushed the 

 body of a deer, and I became fully aware that he knew 

 there was one not very far off. This I told to Bayard, 

 who was the only one, with Master Willie and George 

 Bromfield on my pony, who kept me in company. At 

 last Druid began to " feather" in his mysterious way on 

 traces of deer, when, by the tangled cover, we were for a 

 time separated. Presently Bayard called out that Druid 

 was still more fresh on the line of something, and that, 

 though he had encouraged and called to him to come out, 

 he would not leave the bushes where he was. I had 

 scarcely called out "all right" when the forest rang with 

 such a roar from the faithful hound as made the wood 

 peckers fly again ; and ere he had roared a second time, 

 and while I was cheering him to the echo for I well knew 

 he had roused a deer George gave a view halloa. Hound 

 and deer came on to within forty yards of me, and I stood 

 stock still with my gun prepared ; in another instant I 

 could hear the rustle in the bushes made by the deer, when, 



