‘My name, sir, is Eachainn, and you see there’ll be some things that folks who are very clever don’t know. A bochan, sir, is what you call in Beurla a hobgobolin.’
‘I see your drift, man, I see your drift, and care not what a bochan or a fiddlestick means; but a pointer is a dog of right Spanish breed, which has such instinct that he smells out the birds without seeing them, so that when he has got one in a covey within reach of his nose, he holds up his leg, and stands stock still, until his master comes up and bleezes away at them.’
‘Sitting, sir?’ asked Eachainn, with a roguish look.
‘Aye, man, sitting or standing, ’tis all the same.’
‘You’ll maybe be wanting such dogs in the low country, but they’ll no be wanted in the Highlands. Here, sir,’ continued he, remembering the hoax about Luno and gunmaking; ‘here, sir, the people can smell the game as good as your dogs.’
‘What’s that you say man? D’ye think of clishmaclavering me with any of your big Hielan’ lees?’
‘Would you like me to smell out some muir-hens for you, sir?’
‘You smell out game! smell out your grandmother! D’ye think to deceive me with such havers?’
‘Do you s’pose you could hit the poor craters—sittin’ too—if I hadn’t smelt them out for you, sir?’
‘Faith, friend you’re no blate—smell out indeed! And pray, callant, can you smell out any more of them?’