102 CHAMOIS HUNTING. 



is about to throw or thrust it down from the precipice, 

 if he draweth his knife and will thrust the same into 

 it, the chamois pmheth its own body with force upon the 

 knife; whereupon it is caught, and falleth downwards 

 from a great height. The skin remaineth generally 

 quite unbroken*." The same old writer tells us : 

 " Some hunters do drink the blood and the fat, that 

 they may thereby obtain a steady head and freedom 

 from giddiness when they come to steep places, and 

 when they must hold on very firmly." 



It is not at all unlikely that these properties were 

 attributed to the animal's blood ; for the hunter, like 

 all men who live much with Nature, and make com- 

 panionship with her various aspects, is by no means 

 free from superstition. At the present day even the 

 peasantry of Bavaria consider a certain part of the stag, 

 when dried and powdered, a potent remedy in diseases 

 of the bladder ; and the resinous-looking drops which 

 are found in the corners of the hart's eyes, called by 

 some the "tears" of the stag, are looked upon by 

 many as a sure specific in various disorders. 



Strange are the shifts to which it is said the cha- 

 niois-hunter is sometimes put, when, like the animal 



* This is true. Though the body be never so bruised, the skin 

 always remains whole. It is also a peculiarity of the skin of a cha- 

 mois that it is of the same thickness throughout. By this you may 

 always distinguish it from other skins, which are much thinner in 

 some places than in others. Dealers who wish to palm off doe for 

 chamois leather assist the deception by cutting a slit in some part 

 and sewing the hole up again, such being always found in real cha- 

 mois-skins where the ball has passed. If however you feel the skins 

 carefully, you can hardly be deceived. 



