136 "SNAKES AND PUDDOCK-STOOLS." [PARTI. 



fishing in general as an ignoble and degrading 

 sport rather than otherwise. Shooting was his 

 delight, when engaged about which I never saw a 

 day too long, or a hill too high or "coarse" for him, 

 though upwards of sixty seasons had passed over 

 his head. It was a favourite boast of his that he 

 had been forty-three years a fox-hunter, and never 

 had missed a fair shot at a fox at forty yards, 

 "Forrty yarrds, Sirr yees." 



Besides Eels we used, whenever we could get 

 them, to indulge in mushrooms, which are also 

 objects of suspicion to Highlanders, and gene- 

 rally considered by them utterly unfit for food. 

 One of our party too was curious in the matter of 

 funguses, and, not confining himself to the ortho- 

 dox mushroom, used to bring in all kinds of 

 "agarics and fungi" of as questionable appear- 

 ance as those described in Shelley's Sensitive 

 plant, all of which he insisted on having dressed, 

 and made a point of doing full justice to. I was 

 once induced (in an evil hour) to make an essay 

 on a puff-ball, being assured that it would be quite 

 as good as the common mushroom. Anything so 

 nasty I never tasted. From its appearance and 

 consistency I could well have imagined it to be 

 broiled slug, and its taste was, to my palate, very 



