Page:The Life of the Fields, Jefferies, 1884.djvu/176

162 is the same with the Red Indians, and the white trappers and hunters in wild regions, who depend much more on their knowledge of the ways and habits of the fur-bearing animals than upon their skill with the rifle. A man may be an excellent shot with gun or rifle, and yet be quite incapable of coping on comparatively equal terms with wild creatures. He is a sportsman, depending on skill, quick sight, and ready hand—not a hunter. Perhaps the nearest approach to it in legitimate English sport is in fly-fishing and salmon fishing, when the sportsman relies upon his own unassisted efforts. Deer-stalking, where the sportsman has to reckon on the wind, and its curious twists and turns in valleys and round rocks, would be a very near approach to it did the stalker stalk alone. But all this work is usually done for him by an attendant, a native Highlander; and this man really does pit his intelligence against that of the stag. The Highlander actually is a Red Indian, or hunter, and in this sense struggles with the wild animal. The poacher is the hunter on illegitimate ground, and with arts which it has been mutually agreed shall not be employed.

Considered in this sense it is interesting to observe to what extent the intelligence even of a fish reaches—and I think upon reflection it will be found that the fish is as clever as any creature could be in its position. I deny altogether that the cold-blooded fish—looked on with contempt so far as its intellectual powers are concerned—is stupid, or slow to learn. On the contrary fish are remarkably quick, not only under natural conditions, but quick at accommodating