DEER KIND. 335 



When the female is ready to bring forth, she 

 seeks a retreat in the thickest part of the woods, 

 being not less apprehensive of the buck, from 

 whom she then separates, than of the wolf, the 

 wild cat, and almost every ravenous animal of the 

 forest : she generally produces two at a time, and 

 three but very rarely. In about ten or twelve 

 days these are able to follow their dam, except in 

 cases of warm pursuit, when their strength is not 

 equal to the fatigue. Upon such occasions, the 

 tenderness of the dam is very extraordinary ; 

 leaving them in the deepest thickets, she offers 

 herself to the danger, flies before the hounds, and 

 does all in her power to lead them from the re- 

 treat where she has lodged her little ones. Such 

 animals as are nearly upon her own level she 

 boldly encounters ; attacks the stag, the wild cat, 

 and even the wolf; and while she has life, con- 

 tinues her efforts to protect her young. Yet all 

 her endeavours are often vain ; about the month 

 of May, which is her fawning time, there is a 

 greater destruction among those animals than at 

 any other season of the year. Numbers of the 

 fawns are taken alive by the peasants ; numbers 

 are found out and worried by the dogs, and still 

 more by the wolf, which has always been their 

 most inveterate enemy. By these continual de- 

 predations upon this beautiful creature, the roe- 

 buck is every day becoming scarcer, and the 

 whole race in many countries is wholly worn out. 

 Tfiey were once common in England : the hunts- 

 men, who characterized only such beasts as they 

 knew, have given name's to the different kinds 



53 



