SHAUN RUADHA. 



for the sport, twirls in his hand the 6i taste of a 

 stick " with which he is wont to beat for a hare 

 or a woodcock in the way of business, or to em- 

 ploy for recreation in a humorous skull-breaking 

 game, which not unfrequently comes off at the 

 cross-road village beyond. Shaun thinks it 

 better to charge with heavy shot, and steal as 

 quietly as possible towards a sure find that he 

 knows for wild ducks. A snipe, bleating 

 loudly, starts from the rushes, but the nobler 

 quarry in prospect has saved him from a 

 chance of being the first tenant of the day's 

 bag. A loutish heron, with a bronchitic snuffle, 

 flops out of a ditch. The fowler and his hench- 

 man dread that the whutter made by the long- 

 legged angler will frighten the mallards and 

 their nervous companions ; but no, if they are 

 here they have not taken any notice of either 

 heron or snipe. The fowler has directed that 

 Bob and Nell, the setters, should be tied and 

 kept in hand by Shaun, as the patter of their 

 feet might discover the movement projected. 

 Alas ! this piece of strategy is fatal to the suc- 

 cess of the undertaking. Bob is shaking and 

 trembling with sheer excitement, and for his 



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