i86 RED DEER. 



whether they are detected or not. They 

 simply let it be known that they do not 

 intend to be taken ; they have guns and will 

 use them, and if the keepers attack them it is 

 at the risk of their lives. The question arises 

 whether a too severe punishment for game 

 theft may not be responsible for this, and 

 whether it does not defeat its object, since if 

 a poacher is aware that a heavy term of im- 

 prisonment awaits him, he will rather fire 

 than be captured. At all events, such is the 

 condition of things in some districts, and the 

 keepers, for this reason, rarely interfere with 

 such a gang. Such severe terms of impri- 

 sonment are cruel to keepers, whose lives 

 are thereby imperilled. 



The path has now led up by the oak 

 woods to a great height, and the setting 

 sun gleams over the hills of Eed Deer Land. 

 It is a land full of old memories. It is 

 strange that Sir Francis Drake, like Virgil, 

 should have acquired the fame of a magician. 

 Sometimes in the hottest noontide of summer, 



