but do you know his habits?"

"No, sir; but I spent a month watching a Dartmoor deer."

"A month! Can't learn anything in a month, boy; but you've struck
the right book. The pages that are spread out under the sky hold the
right teaching, for those who wish to learn about animals. There are
writers who make a study of structure; they argue from bones, and
classify; but bones don't tell us about the living flesh and blood.
You take my meaning?"

"You make a difference between the structure of animals and their
habits."

"That's so, my lad. Ever read Jeffreys, and the sketches by the 'Son
of the Marshes'?"

"They're splendid."

Mr. Hume nodded and filled a pipe, having a footlong stem, made out
of the wing-bone of an albatross.

"I want to describe the personal habits of animals in their
surroundings. I said 'personal' habits. Do you take me?"

"No, sir."

"You think I should use another word, and say, perhaps,
'distinctive' habits. I say personal. Now, you take a lion--a bush
lion or a veld lion, a yellow lion or a black lion, young or old.