The hounds found a doe who broke cover close to me in a small patina and made straight running for the river. She had no sooner reached it than I beard her cry out, and as she was closely followed I thought she was seized. However, the whole pack shortly returned, evidently thrown out, and I began to abuse them pretty roundly, thinking that they had lost their game in the river. So they had, but in an excusable manner; the poor doe had been washed down a rapid, and had broken her thigh. We found her dead under a hollow rock in the middle of the river.
Here we had a fine exemplification of the danger of the mysterious pools.
While I was opening the elk, with the pack all round me licking their lips in expectation, old "Madcap" was jostled by one of the greyhounds, and slipped into a basin among the rocks, which formed an edge of about two feet above the surface.
The opposite side of the pool was hemmed in by rocks about six feet high, and the direction of the under-current was at once shown by poor old "Madcap" being swept up against this high wall of rock, where she remained paddling with all her might in an upright position.
I saw the poor beast would be sucked under, and yet I could not save her. However, I did my best at the risk of falling in myself.
I took off my handkerchief and made a slip-knot, and begging Pelly to lie down on the top of the rock, I took his hand while I clung to the face of the wall as I best could by a little ledge of about two inches' width.
With great difficulty I succeeded in hooking the bitch's head in the slip-knot, but in my awkward position I could not use sufficient strength to draw her out. I could only support her head above the water, which I could distinctly feel was drawing her from me. Presently she gave a convulsive struggle, which freed her head from the loop, and in an instant she disappeared.
I could not help going round the rock to see if her body should be washed out when the torrent reappeared, when, to my astonishment, up she popped all right, not being more than half drowned by her subterranean excursion, and we soon helped her safe ashore. Fortunately for her, the passage had been sufficiently large to pass her, although I have no doubt a man would have been held fast and drowned.
(Editor:meat)