212 A SPORTSMAN'S EDEN. 



refrain, the more readily as at that moment he 

 is some considerable distance out of reach., going 

 like a winner of the Grand National over all sorts 

 of impediments which speedily stop that noble 

 animal. By dint of using my hands more than 

 my feet, I follow him for about half an hour. 

 Then I see the stag standing, looking back at me 

 about 150 yards off. I am sobbing like a broken- 

 winded cab-horse after breasting Highgate Hill. 

 I miss him like a man, both barrels. Jocko says 

 nothing ; he does more ; he runs again and I try to 

 follow him. The dusk is turning into dark. I 

 cannot possibly go another hundred yards. But 

 the stag is getting done too. That first shot hit 

 him in the shoulder, and just as I am about to 

 drop from sheer exhaustion he lurches heavily, 

 stumbles, recovers himself, and then comes down 

 with a crash dead, but game to the last gasp. 

 Jocko and I lay and panted beside him in the 

 snow, and then, having skinned him and admired 

 his branching antlers really fine antlers for a 

 white tail, and the strange long white fud from 

 which he takes his name I ask how far it is back 

 to camp. ' Maybe seven miles,' says Jocko, and 

 maybe he was not exaggerating. I know the 

 moon was up, and I had got tired even of looking 

 forward to the luxuries of hot mutton and whisky 

 toddy before he announced that it was only three 



