WAYS OF RED DEER. 99 



stag is killed and paunched quantities of 

 apples drop out and roll about the ground, 

 the peel not so much as cracked ; the poorer 

 boys think nothing of eating these as they 

 find them fresh from the deer, without so 

 much as washing the apples, and what they 

 cannot eat they pocket for future enjoyment. 

 These are the principal things the deer feed 

 on in the cultivated fields. They go far down 

 into the valleys and plains for the wheat. 

 "When the damage they do is enumerated it 

 is evident at once that staff-hunting is a 

 sport of the most fascinating character, or 

 such losses would not be endured for a 

 month. 



On the moors the deer eat the fresh 

 grass that springs after tracts are burned, 

 the tops of the heather, and the grass that 

 grows between the young firs in planta- 

 tions. They will eat the leaves of haw- 

 thorn and beech, and in the covers are said 

 to sometimes take oak leaves. Bramble 

 leaves thev feed on both in summer and 



H 2 



