SHOOTING THE WOODS GROUSE 363 
seemed to know all about such places, and at once 
started up the leeward side of the ravine with slow 
and cautious trot, while the younger, named Frank, 
seemed to have an inttition that the other dog knew 
more than he did, and slowed down his pace to about 
the same. And soon Jack’s trot subsided to a walk 
as his nose caught the faint breeze that played over 
the shady side of the hollow, and his tail slackened 
its lashing motion and settled down to a slow wavy 
swing. Quietly he moved along, with nose upraised 
just above the deep green of the ferns and prairie grass 
and the bright golden hue of the lady-slippers and the 
carmine of the wild peas, raising it from time to time 
still higher, with inquiring sniff, and swinging steadily 
off to the leeward so as to keep the breeze fairly in 
his nose all the time. And soon the old dog’s tail began 
to straighten and the joints of his legs to stiffen, and 
he turned his head slowly from side to side, and snuffed 
the air more cautiously as he moved, more and more 
slowly, along. And all the time Frank coming up 
the other slope, some hundred yards away, with eyes 
fixed intently upon Jack, imitating all his movements, 
even more strongly than if he had smelt something 
himself, instead of taking Jack’s word for it. 
Suddenly Jack stops, and as suddenly Frank does 
the same, and at the same instant a line of mingled 
white, black and gray, with roaring wings enveloping 
the whole in a haze of brown, bursts from the rank 
ferns some ten yards ahead of the dog and darts like 
an arrow through the green arcade. 
