The trained hunter reads all
this as in a book, but the most of us can do no more than recognise the
writing when it has been pointed out to us.
[Illustration: HOUSE-TOPS, MOGADOR]
So it happened that my morning ride with the hardy hunter, whose
achievements bulk next to those of the late Sir John Drummond Hay in the
history of Moorish sport, had an interest that did not depend altogether
upon the wild forest paths through which he led the way. He told me how
at daybreak the pack of cross-bred hounds came from garden, copse, and
woodland, racing to the steps of the Palm Tree House, and giving tongue
lustily, as though they knew there was sport afoot. One or two grizzled
huntsmen who had followed every track in the Argan Forest were waiting in
the patio for his final instructions, and he told them of hoof prints that
had revealed to his practised eye a "solitaire" boar of more than ordinary
size. He had tracked it for more than three hours on the previous day,
past the valley where our tents were set, and knew now where the lair was
chosen.
"He has been lying under an argan tree, one standing well away from the
rest at a point where the stream turns sharply, about a mile from the old
kasbah in the wood, and he has moved now to make a new lair.
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