HUNTING THE ROE. 107 



and tearing at it like two bull-dog puppies. At last they 

 came to a pitched battle with each other, biting, squealing, 

 and tugging, and leaving the trout to its fate. On this the 

 old one interfered, and making them quiet, gave the trout to 

 one of them as his own. The other young one, on seeing the 

 parent do this, no longer interfered, but sat quietly looking 

 on, till the old otter (who in the meantime had renewed her 

 fishing) came back with a large trout for it also. 



When she brings a fish to the shore for her young ones, 

 she calls them by a kind of loud whistling cry. Altogether 

 this is a most interesting animal, graceful in its movements, 

 and in salmon rivers not nearly so destructive and injurious 

 as he is supposed to be, feeding on eels, flounders, and trout 

 far more than on salmon : in such situations he is most un- 

 justly persecuted. 



The roe now are in perfect condition, and I find the snow 

 does not in the least spoil the scent in hunting them with 

 beagles. It is a very amusing kind of shooting where the 

 woods are sufficiently broken and interspersed with open 

 ground, so as to enable one to see both roe and hounds 

 pretty often. In drawing the large woods I am often 

 annoyed by the hounds going off after a fox, who generally 

 leads them straight away for several miles, tires the little 

 beagles, and finally escapes into his earth without getting 

 shot : but occasionally he pays for his depredations, notwith- 

 standing his cunning. 



Soon after throwing off in one of the large covers near the 

 sea, the hounds begin to find the cold scent of roe, and 

 gradually working up to the thickets, often start the animal 

 in view. Away they then go, making the woods echo again 

 with their deep tones, the younger dogs taking the lead. The 

 roe at first tries to avoid leaving the first division of wood in 

 which he is found, but on the hounds sticking to him, he 

 crosses some wide, open heather and swamp to the higher 

 grounds. Here the trees are older, with little underwood.; 

 so after a rattling run through all this, I can reckon on their 

 crossing the swamps again to the thickets, where the buck 

 was first found. He comes to the head of the brae and 

 stands listening to the hounds, carefully examining the wide 

 flats of heath, wood, and swamp below him. The hounds 

 come nearer and nearer, and still the buck seems unwilling 

 to cross the open ground. At last the dogs are close to him, 

 and then only he descends the bank, springing over the 



