SHEEP-HUNTING 179 



burnishing and shining like silver on ice and rock. 

 Mists creep up the hillsides, grey in the valleys, pink 

 on the tops, brooding sluggishly in heavy clouds 

 among the low^er masses of timber, gauzy, thin, 

 transparent, and hanging in long wisps and shreds 

 from the higher summits of the range. Of a sudden 

 a bare naked crag, piercing the heavens, blazes into 

 dazzling light, like a fiery beacon. Peak after peak 

 answers the signal. The light flows down. The 

 mists float up. Black darkness still reigns in the 

 valleys, the eastern slopes are still wrapped in sleep, 

 but the western hillsides are sparkling with the 

 brightness of a white frost or dewdrops under a 

 dazzling sun, and all the fells and peaks above them 

 are bathed in light. There is nothing so beautiful 

 as beautiful scenery, and it is never seen to better 

 advantage than in the first hour of the dawn. 



It is not difficult, after several days' hard work 

 hunting, to spend an idle day or two in such a scene, 

 watching the face of nature ever changing under 

 cloud and sunshine, calm and tempest. The eye 

 never aches at the sight of lovely scenery, nor does 

 the soul sadden. It is the one thing that never 

 palls, with which neither mind nor body is ever 

 weary. 



The love of hunting is a passion that leads a man 



