6 REMINISCENCES OF A HUNTSMAN. 



round it: Knyvet and Duruset soon scrambled over 

 the rail, and were fighting through the bushes for a 

 tree. Underneath the brambles there was a hidden 

 ditch, into which Knyvet fell and got cast on his 

 back ; while Duruset, more active, reached the tree, 

 and its boughs being like a ladder, up he went, and 

 when he found himself safe, and saw that Knyvet 

 was in the ditch, he sung at him every scrap from 

 every opera or song he was conversant with, that he 

 thought would fit his predicament. I had a double 

 gun with a rolling ball in each barrel ; and with a 

 view to drop the beef as clean as I would venison, 

 as the bullock passed us — for it was not at us that 

 he was running — I shot at his head, and missed him. 

 " Dang it," said the drover, " you can't shoot ; give 

 me the gun." This nettled me, and I put the second 

 bullet through the animal's body ; it sickened the 

 ox, and he stopped; and, reloading, I walked out upon 

 him, and shot him through the head. By this time, 

 and having heard a cry from the treed Duruset that 

 " the curtain had dropped upon the bull," Knyvet 

 extricated himself and arose, and asked Duruset 

 " how he could be such a coward as to climb into a 

 tree?" No answer. "Come down," said Knyvet; 

 " danger's all over, and let's go up to the bull." No 

 answer, but quantities of the scaly bark and dust 

 of the tree kept falling down ; on this Knyvet looked 

 up, and saw Duruset looking down and behind him, 

 with his hands firmly clasped round the stem of the 

 fir. The fact was, that he was totally unused to 

 climbing, and in coming down he had got across one 

 of the boughs, and could not tell how to be rid of 

 it ; there it stuck out like a peacock's tail from 

 beneath his coat, in motion, and waving as if it was 



