Upon one occasion, being left in the rear by the others, he came upon a wood-duck that had lain dead for some time in the pond meadow. After rolling on it very thoroughly in the manner of dogs and wolves, to identify themselves with their finds in the noses of other dogs, he succeeded, after much difficulty, in bearing it home and into the dining room during a company tea, where he laid it at Miss Jule’s feet. He had such an expression of bringing a gift worth having upon his face, that also wore a broad grin, that no one, even among the guests, had the heart to scold him, but politely held their breaths and noses while Miss Jule called Colin “a good fellow,” and escorted him out, accompanied by the duck in a dust-pan. She also allowed him the crowning joy of burying it, which he did as a matter of course, instead of casting it ignobly on the refuse heap, which would have not only hurt his feelings, but have given him the extra trouble of retrieving it a second time, and so prolonged the odour. When Ben Uncas & Co. hunted ground beasts their methods were wholly different from their pursuit of tree climbers. Of ground beasts the woodchuck and muskrat seemed the most interesting quarry, and of climbers the breed of vagrant wildcats and the coons of Pine Ridge were the favourites. The native tailless bob-cat or red lynx was now so rare as to be, like the rattlesnake, almost a hearsay beast of imagination, seen only by the people who, carrying brown jugs, took a short cut through the Den woods on their way home from the cider-mill, and paused to rest on the way. There were many old fields and orchards between Happy Hall and the Hilltop Kennels, and when Ben Uncas & Co. organized for hunting, three years before this time, there was barely a five-acre lot without its woodchuck family, while Waddles’s old bugaboo, the skunk, called scent cat by its comrades through fearsome politeness, inhabited stone fences and tumble-down cellars at will. In fact, one pair were so bold as to raise a litter under the henhouse at Pinkie Scott’s, in order to be conveniently near a poultry and egg market, while Pinkie petted and fed the little things, mistaking them for queer black and white kittens, until one evening, when Hans Sachs was with her, their mother came back and objected. Then Pinkie’s illusion and the skunk family were dispelled together. Of course people trapped skunks, and they were more or less hunted by other dogs, but to the method of Ben Uncas & Co. belonged the honour of having freed the entire hillside of the pests, even though as individuals they had often been obliged to retire to private life in consequence.