126 IVrLD SPORTS OF THE HIGHLANDS chap. 



the whole day if necessary, not fatiguing himself uselessly, but 

 quietly and determinedly following it up. If the roe fell and 

 he found it, he would return to me, and then lead me up to 

 the animal, whatever the distance might be. With red-deer he 

 was also most useful. The first time that he saw me kill a 

 deer he was very much surprised ; I was walking alone with 

 him through some woods in Ross-shire, looking for woodcocks ; 

 I had killed two or three, when I saw such recent signs of deer, 

 that I drew the shot from one barrel, and replaced it with ball. 

 I then continued my walk. ^ Before I had gone far, a fine 

 barren hind sprang out of a thicket, and as she crossed a small 

 hollow, going directly away from me, I fired at her, breaking 

 her backbone with the bullet ; of course she dropped immediately, 

 and Rover, who was a short distance behind me, rushed forward 

 in the direction of the shot, expecting to have to pick up a 

 woodcock ; but on coming up to the hind, who was struggling 

 on the ground, he ran round her with a look of astonishment, 

 and then came back to me with an expression in his face plainly 

 saying, " What have you done now ? — you have shot a cow or 

 something." But on my explaining to him that the hind was 

 fair game, he ran up to her and seized her by the throat like a 

 bulldog. Ever afterwards he was peculiarly fond of deer- 

 hunting, and became a great adept, and of great use. When I 

 sent him to assist two or three hounds to start a roe — as soon 

 as the hounds were on the scent. Rover always came back 

 to me and waited at the pass : I could enumerate endless 

 anecdotes of his clever feats in this way. 



Though a most aristocratic dog in his usual habits, when 

 staying with me in England once, he struck up an acquaintance 

 with a ratcatcher and his curs, and used to assist in their 

 business when he thought that nothing else was to be done, 

 entering into their way of going on, watching motionless at the 

 rats' holes when the ferrets were in, and as the ratcatcher told 

 me, he was the best dog of them all, and always to be depended 

 on for showing if a rat was in a hole, corn-stack, or elsewhere ; 

 never giving a false alarm, or failing to give a true one. The 

 moment, however, that he saw me, he instantly cut his humble 

 friends, and denied all acquaintance with them in the most 

 comical manner. 



The shepherds' dogs in the mountainous districts often 



