SLUGS. 73 



pursued for its own sake. Many high qualities are requisite 

 for marked success in the sport. It requires watchfulness, 

 patience, ingenuity, a knowledge of the habits of the prey 

 and of its likes and dislikes, and a certain intrepidity as to 

 the risks from night air and damp feet, for it is only when 

 the ground is moist that anything like a good bag can be 

 hoped for. 



The slug is as defenceless as the pigeon, and no greater 

 share of courage is required for slug hunting than for 

 pigeon shooting; but whereas the one amusement is a 

 slaughter of innocents, the other is the destruction of 

 ravening beasts, and stands therefore in a far higher cate- 

 gory. The slug trusts neither to speed nor fierceness ; we 

 know from story how his cousin, the snail, when attacked, 

 put to flight a troop of tailors, by the exhibition of his 

 horns, or, as the scientific would tell us, of his eyes on 

 their upreared stalks. But if the slug possesses eyes, he 

 makes no show of them. We are aware that he possesses 

 a rudimentary shell, which he carries somewhere in his 

 body, and it is possible that he stows away his eyes with 

 equal care. 



Secretiveness is, indeed, a strong point in his character, 

 and it enables him to hide himself with such marked 

 success that, until he chooses from hunger or inclination 

 to walk abroad, he can defy the most careful searcher. 

 The slug, unlike the snail, leaves a trail behind him, 

 and this remains visible for hours. The creature is 

 fully aware of the danger which this shining evidence of 

 his passage would entail upon him, but his native craft 

 enables him to baffle his pursuers. As the fox doubles 

 across his trail to throw off the hounds, so does the slug 



