ROEBUCK SHOOTING ON THE BANKS OF THE RHINE. 259 



in. A front shot was offered and promptly accepted. The 

 bright gay countenance, the proudly antlered forehead were lost 

 in a smoke cloud. The fell deed again was done, for a certainty. 

 But a moment afterwards the old forester sprang on to a bank ; 



and a barrel apiece went from us into thick jungle that we 

 might have bombarded for a week without reaching any object 

 within. The old man had a lot to say, in High Dutch and 

 patois — being evidently of opinion that we had bungled the 

 business once more. Indeed, he pulled me back as if we had 

 been walking upon a wounded tiger, when I pointed out a 

 prone but still struggling form, not ten yards from where our 

 game had disappeared. Then I thought he would have danced 

 — till with a swoop he came down upon the roebuck, and knifed 

 him at the back of the head as you or I would have done a 

 pike. " Ver' gut roe ! " he kept repeating at intervals for the 

 next hour. And this time he consented to act as intermediary 

 for my obtaining the whole head. " Five pounds of meat I 



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