THE USE OF DOGS. 295 



tlie water, as well as for game on land. The same 

 service I have induced from a Ijull and mastiff 

 dog ; and though my hare greyhound so taught 

 would hill rats, and tliough my deer game-liounds 

 would kill, and have killed, both fox and hadger, 

 not one of them but had, with game or eggs, the 

 softest possible mouth ; and so gentle was tlie 

 mouth of Skim, the daughter of Smoker, that if slie 

 found a bantam's eg^^ in tlie garden in front of 

 the drawing-room window at Harold Hall, she 

 would pick it up and take it in to her mistress, 

 with the tender shell unharmed. This gentleness 

 abandoned her one morning, when my friend, 

 Mr. St. Leger, had come to hunt with me when 

 the frost was too hard for hounds to go out, for, 

 unused to do2:s as much as Skim was unused to 

 rude treatment, on seeing her stretched that frosty 

 morning at full length before the drawing-room 

 fire, and wanting more room himself to stand 

 before it, he pushed her with his foot to ^^get 

 out.'' The push was instantly resented, for Skim 

 seized his almost new red coat by the tail, and 

 very nearly tore it from the waist buttons. This 

 gentlest of all gentle things, when kindly used, 

 fought a duel with a large badger I had taken. 



