MAMMALIA— STAG. 337 



The most common color of the stag is yellow, though there are many 

 found of a brown, and many of a red color. White stags are much more 

 uncommon, and seem to be stags become domestic. The color of the horns, 

 like that of the hair, seems in particular to depend on the nature and age 

 of the animal. The horns of the young stags are whiter than those of the 

 old ones. Of those stags, also, whose hair is of a light yellow, the horns 

 are often of a sallow hue, and disagreeable to the eye. 



This animal seems to have good eyes, an exquisite smell, and an excel- 

 lent ear. When he would hearken to any thing, he raises his head, pricks 

 up his ears, and then he hears from a great distance. When he issues from 

 a little coppice, or some other spot half covered, he stops, in order to take a 

 full view around him, and then snuffs up the wind, in order to try whether 

 he can discover the scent of aught that may give him disturbance. Though 

 naturally rather simple, he is yet far from being destitute of curiosity and 

 cunning. If any one whistles, or calls aloud to him from a great distance, 

 he instantly stops short, and gazes with fixed attention, with even a kind 

 of admiration ; and if he sees neither arms nor dogs, he passes along 

 quietly, and without altering his pace. With equal tranquillity and pleasure 

 he seems also to listen to the shepherd's pipe, or flageolet ; and the hunters, 

 in order to embolden him, sometimes use these instruments. In general, he 

 fears men much less than he does dogs, and entertains neither distrust nor 

 artifice, but in proportion as he is disturbed. He eats slowly, chooses his 

 food, and seeks afterwards to repose himself, that he may ruminate at 

 ^eisure, though the act of rumination he does not seem to perform with the 

 mme ease as the ox; nor is it without undergoing much violence that the 

 4tag can throw up the food contained in his first stomach. He seldom 

 lrinks in the winter, and seldomer still in the spring. 



In England, the number of red deer is diminishing. This has, no doubt, 

 arisen, from the grazing of sheep and cattle, by which the seclusion the red 

 deer are so fond of, has been broken in upon, both in the mountains and in 

 the valleys. As the more lucrative occupation of the soil extends into the 

 remoter districts, the race must further and further decrease ; nor is the 

 period at which they will be wholly extinct, in all probability, very distant. 

 Now, unless by a person, whom long observation has rendered familiar 

 with their haunts, the country may be traversed without seeing even one. 

 From their fleetness, and the nature of the ground on which they are found, 

 horses and hounds are of no direct use in the chase of them, as the steed 

 \vould be required to leap precipices of fifty feet, instead of gates of five 

 bars; and the dogs would be constantly tumbling into gullies and ravines, 

 which are cleared by the deer at one bound. They cannot be driven "with 

 hound and horn," as was the case in the days of "the barons bold;" neither 

 can they be collected and hemmed in, after the somewhat similar manner 

 in which the Highland chiefs conducted their sports. Still, there are a few 

 places where a person who has been habituated to the occupation, and who 

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