One gloomy October evening, Lord Robert was returning with his gun and dogs through the park, attended by a gamekeeper. He had pursued his amusement that day with very little success: everything had gone wrong; the dogs had pointed badly, and his new fowling-piece, that had cost him twenty guineas only the week before, had hung fire several times, at the very moment when the game sprang before him the finest mark possible. In short, he had suffered disappointment enough to vex the heart of the most patient person in the world, who had never in his life felt what real affliction was. At this unlucky minute, it was Philip Harley's ill fortune to cross the park by a public footway that led through the grounds. It was the first day Philip had resumed his work since the death of his sister; and he was walking in a melancholy way, carrying his basket of tools, with his eyes fixed on the ground, attending very little to what was passing around him, and Rover was trudging by his side, when, unluckily, just as Lord Robert came up to him, a hare darted out of some bushes, and Rover scampered after it. "That is the way all the game is poached off the estate!" exclaimed Lord Robert in a fit of passion; and, yielding to the influence of temper, he levelled his gun at the dog. The piece, that had so many times missed fire that day, now rang sharp and true: the faithful creature was mortally wounded; he crawled feebly to his master's feet, and expired. Philip hung over his poor dog, while he saw him die, with anguish that gave a painful sensation to Lord Robert; yet still, under the dominion of temper, he said to his servant-- "What a fool the fellow makes of himself about a dog!" Philip lifted the body of his poor favourite from the ground, and taking it in his arms, rushed by the young lord, giving him a look of contempt and indignation as he passed. "It is the dog that used to lead about his blind sister," said the humane gamekeeper. "She is just dead." Lord Robert then remembered meeting Kate and the dog when he first came home: he had patted her curly head and admired her beauty. "Was it blind Kate's dog?" said Lord Robert. "Had I known that, he might have destroyed every head of game on the estate before I would have shot him."