est work, was to get on the track and
follow up through the jungle. This I accordingly did for about a mile,
at which distance I arrived at a small swampy plain in the centre of
the jungle. Here, to my surprise, I saw old Bluebeard sitting up and
looking faint, covered with blood, with no other dog within view. The
truth was soon known upon examination. No less than five holes were
cut in his throat by a leopard's claws, and by the violent manner in
which the poor dog strained and choked, I felt sure that the windpipe
was injured. There was no doubt that he had received the stroke at the
same time that Lena was wounded beneath the rocky mountain when the elk
was at bay; and nevertheless, the staunch old dog had persevered in the
chase till the difficulty of breathing brought him to a standstill. I
bathed the wounds, but I knew it was his last day, poor old fellow!

I sounded the bugle for a few minutes, and having collected some of the
scattered pack I returned to the tent, leading the wounded dog, whose
breathing rapidly became more difficult. I lost no time in fomenting
and poulticing the part, but the swelling had commenced to such an
extent that there was little hope of recovery.

This was a dark day for the pack. Benton returned in the afternoon
from a search for the missing hounds, and, as he descended the deep
hill-side on approaching the tent, I saw tent he and a native were
carrying something slung upon a pole. At first I thought it was an
elk's head, which the missing hounds might have run to bay, but on his
arrival the worst was soon known.

It was poor Leopold, one of my best dogs. He was all but dead, with
hopeless wounds in his throat and belly. He had been struck by a
leopard within a few yards of Benton's side, and, with his usual pluck,
the dog turned upon the leopard in spite of his wounds, when the
cowardly brute, seeing the man, turned and fled.

That night Leopold died. The next morning Bluebeard was so bad that I
returned home with him slung in a litter between two men. Poor fellow!
he never lived to reach his comfortable kennel, but died in the litter
within a mile of home. I had him buried by the side of old Smut, and
there are no truer dogs on the earth than the two that there lie
together.

A very few weeks after Bluebeard's death, however, I got a taste of
revenge out of one of the race.

Palliser and I were out shooting, and we found a single bull elephant
asleep in the dry