110 WILD SPORTS OF THE HIGHLANDS. _ [cmap. x1v 
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 pe- 
culiarly 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 enume- 
rate endless anecdotes of his clever feats in this way. 
Though a most aristocratic dog in his usual habits, when stay- 
ing 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 atrue 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 show 
the most wonderful instinct in assisting their masters, who, with- 
out their aid, would have but little command over a large flock 
of wild black-faced sheep. It is a most interesting sight to see 
a clever dog turn a large flock of these sheep in whichever 
direction his master wishes, taking advantage of the ground, and 
making a wide sweep to get round the sheep without frightening 
them, till he gets beyond them, and then rushing barking from 
flank to flank of the flock, and bringing them all up in close array 
to the desired spot. When, too, the shepherd wishes to catch a 
particular sheep out of the flock, I have seen him point it out 
to the dog, who would instantly distinguish it from the rest, and 
follow it up till he caught it. Often I have seen the sheep rush 
into the middle of the flock, but the dog, though he must neces- 
sarily have lost sight of it amongst the rest, would immediately 
single it out again, and never leave the pursuit.till he had the 
sheep prostrate, but unhurt, under his feet. I have been with a 
shepherd when. he has consigned a certain part of his flock toa doz 
to be driven home, the man aceamvanying me farther on to the 
