SCIENCE OF THE WILDS, POETRY OF SPORT. 171 



CHAPTER VIII. 



THE SCIENCE OF THE WILDS, AND THE POETRY OF 



SPORT. 



Presentiment of Impending Evil Manifested by Animals — One 

 Object of this Work to Win Better Care for tlie Brute Creation 

 — Three Cheers for the Prussians — Wounded Wild Ducks — 

 The Gunner not the Sportsman — The true Sportsman finds 

 Inexhaustible Beauty and Interest in Nature — Wheatears — 

 Instant Recognition of the Distant Hawk by Birds — Anecdote 

 of a Lurcher and her Whelps — Lessons to be Learned from the 

 Book of Nature. 



In the matter under the above head, it will be my 

 endeavour simply to deal, in as plain a narrative as 

 possible, miencmnbered by theories, and void of all 

 assmnption, save where subsequent realities tread 

 so closely on things that have undoubtedly gone 

 before, that an inevitable conclusion awaits upon 

 the simple facts disclosed. 



In a former work of mine, to which I have pre- 

 viously alluded, ^ Tales of Life and Death,' I had 

 endeavoured to show how much more strange and 



