The Goto Dofiana 47 



have gone under our wind, and now . . . the hmdscape is 

 vacant. 



"Hinds only bark at a persona,'' remarks Dominguez, as we 

 turn homewards, " never at any other hicho." The stag knew 

 that too. But it w^as a curious way of putting it. 



. . . We are too early; it is still pitch-dark; no sign of 

 dawn beyond a slight opalescence low on the eastern horizon. 

 Moreover, an icy wind rustles across the waste, and for dreary 

 minutes we seek shelter, squatting beneath some friendly gorse. 

 Presently a strange sound — a distinct champing, and close by — 

 strikes our ears. " Un javato comiendo" = "a boar feeding," 

 whispers Dominguez, and creeping a few yards towards an open 

 strath, we dimly descry a dusky monster. At the moment his 

 snout is buried deep in the soil, up to the eyes, and the tremendous 

 muscular power exerted in uprooting bulbs of palmetto arrests 

 attention even in the quarter-light. Now he stands quiescent, 

 head up, and the champing is resumed — a rare scene. The 

 distance is a bare fifteen yards, and all the while my companion 

 insists on hissing in my ear, " tire-lo, tire-lo " = " shoot, shoot." 

 Presently up goes the boar's muzzle ; straight and steadfastly he 

 gazes in our direction, but his glance seemed to pass high over 

 our heads. I don't think he saw us ; yet a consciousness of 

 danger had got home — in two bounds he wheeled and disappeared, 

 headlong, amid the bush beyond. 



. . . Far and wide the bosky glade is furrowed with sinuous 

 trenches, and infinite turrets stand erect as where children build 

 sand-castles on the beach. Last night a troop of wild-pig have 

 sought here for mole-crickets — small fry, one may Lhink ; yet even 

 worms they don't despise, for we have seen masses of these reptiles 

 (some still alive) in the stomach of a newly-shot boar. Follow 

 the spoor onwards, and where it enters a pine-grove, you notice 

 splintered cones and scattered seed. Thus wild-beasts are assist- 

 ing to fulfil nature's plan, and if you care to advance it another 

 stage, turn some soil over those overlooked pine-nuts, and some 

 day forest-monarchs will result to reward another generation. 



Such matutinal forays are, however, but an incident. The 

 main system of dealing with the deer is by driving. For this 

 purpose both the fragrant solitudes of pine and far-stretched wilds 

 of bending cistus are mentally mapped out by the forest-guards 



