286 HUNTING. 



CHAPTER XL 



THE OTTER AND HIS WAYS. 



By man and all living creatures, from the worm in the ground 

 to the eagle in the air, the advent of spring is hailed with a 

 welcome and joy accorded in a like degree to no other period 

 of the year. 



Nature is then waking up from her winter sleep, and, laying 

 aside her snow-white robes, is invoking the sun to expedite her 

 toilet, that soon, like a May queen, she may step out in a 

 mantle of emerald hue, bespangled with gems of purple and 

 gold — the primrose, the cowslip, and wild hyacinth — till her 

 beauty becomes a delight to the eye no art can rival. Early 

 and late, too, is her coming greeted by a choir of heaven-born 

 minstrels, who pour forth their paeans of joy in copse, wood- 

 land and field with sweetest melody. But, gladsome and 

 sympathetic as all the world appears to be at this hopeful 

 period, it may sound strange to say that probably the sole 

 created being who supplies an exception to the general joy is 

 to be found in man. Yet this is truly the case ; for the lan- 

 guage of the often quoted huntsman, when his hounds threw 

 up on a bank of violets and failed to carry the scent a yard 

 farther, still finds an echo in the breast of many such men under 

 like circumstances. 



The experience of every hunting man will remind him that 

 oft on a genial April day, when the lark has been carolling 

 overhead, and the wood anemone, the daisy, and the primrose 

 were weaving at his feet a mosaic carpet, far more beautiful in 

 design than ever graced a Pontiff's hall, he has heard growls of 



