244 THE EULOGY OF RICHARD JEFFERIES. 



hay. Presently, with a truss unbound and 

 loose on his head, he enters the yard, and 

 passes from crib to crib, leaving a little here 

 and a little there. For if he fills one first 

 there will be quarrelling among the cows, and 

 besides, if the crib is too liberally filled, 

 they will pull it out and tread it under 

 foot." 



Here is the portrait from his book of the 

 Ked Deer : 



" There is no more beautiful creature than 

 a stag in his pride of antler, his coat of 

 ruddy gold, his grace of form and motion. 

 He seems the natural owner of the ferny 

 coombes, the oak woods, the broad slopes 

 of heather. They belong to him, and he 

 steps upon the sward in lordly mastership. 

 The land is his, and the hills ; the sweet 

 streams and rocky glens. He is infinitely 

 more natural than the cattle and sheep that 

 have strayed into his domains. For some in- 

 explicable reason, although they, too, are in 

 reality natural, when he is present they look 

 as if they had been put there, and were kept 



