THE PIRST BUCK. 275 



removed, and the buck's head was fair before me. I 

 told Hall I could hit him, but as his head was always 

 in motion at the flies, he rather wished me to wait 

 till the deer stood up for a shot at liis body. How- 

 ever, with a rest on the lower bar of the rail, I felt 

 sure of my shot ; so in a pause which tlie flies per- 

 mitted I shot the buck, and severed the windpipe 

 close to the great jaw-bones. The deer bounded a 

 few yards, and fell dead. A more beautiful buck 

 than this, or a fatter, was never seen ; and as Joseph 

 Hall dressed a deer neater than almost any other 

 keeper that ever came within my observation, when 

 the venison came to my larder everybody, tradesmen 

 and gentlemen, begged that I would buy and kill 

 them a buck like it. It is all very well to ask a man 

 to do this in an enclosed park, but in a forest, and 

 under the circumstances of the deer beins: a g-ood deal 

 shot at, I declined ; all I promised them was, if 

 they would buy the venison, to do the best I could. 

 More bucks were then demanded from the Crown, 

 than Mr. Cumberbatch could give me warrants for, 

 by which I am perfectly certain that, had the deer in 

 the New Forest been properly cared for in bygone 

 3^ears, and a local resident at New Park conversant 

 with the management of forests and " vert and 

 venerie," placed there as master keeper as well as 

 head woodreeve, there would have been no drain on 

 account of that forest on the finances of the Crown. 

 There would have been none of the enormous roguery 

 which Lord Duncan exposed as to timber and turl- 

 cutting, peat-cutting, furze and rush-cutting, while 

 the grazing of horses and cattle would have been 

 restrained within proper and remunerative bounds. 

 All that Lord Duncan exposed I was aware of; and 



T 2 



