ked up into
a pine, then approaching the tree, searched it all round with his nose.
I scanned the branches, but could see nothing except an old hawk's nest,
which had been disused long ago; and if it had not, I do not understand
how it should be interesting to a hound. The dog, however, continued to
investigate the stump and stem of the fir, gaze into the branches,
turning his head from side to side, and setting up his ears like a
cocked-hat. I laid down the buck, and unslung my double gun, and threw a
stick at the nest, when out shot a large pine-martin, and, like a
squirrel, sprung along the branches from tree to tree, till I brought
him to the ground. Dreadnought examined him with a sort of wrinkle in
his whiskers, and turned away, and sat down in dignified abstraction;
while I remounted the buck, and braced the martin to his feet with the
little 'ial-chas,' or foot-straps used for trussing the legs of the roe.
We then resumed our path for the ford.

As I descended through the Boat-Shaw, I heard a heavy sound from the
water, but when I came out from the birches upon the green bank on its
brink, I saw that the river had come down, and was just lipping with the
top of the stone, the sight of whose head was the mark for the last
possibility of crossing. As I looked upon its contracting ring, I
perceived that the stream was still growing; there was no time to be
lost, for the alternative now was to go round by the bridge of
Daltulich, a circuit of four miles; and I knew that, before I reached
the next good ford, the water would be a continuous rapid, probably six
feet deep: I decided, therefore, upon trying the chance where I was.
Dreadnought, who had gone about thirty yards up the stream to take the
deep water in the pool of Craig-Darach, had observed my hesitation with
one leg out and one in the water, and was standing on the point of the
rock waiting the result. As soon as I made another step he plunged into
the river, and in a few moments was rolling on the bank of silver sand
thrown up by the back-water upon the opposite side of the river. As I
advanced through the stream, he looked at me occasionally, and I at
him, and the beautiful smooth sand and green bank upon his side--for by
that time I began to wish I was there too. I was then in pretty deep
water for a ford, but still some distance from the deepest part; my kilt
was floating round me in the boiling water, and the strong eddy, formed
by the stream running ag