368 CHAMOIS HUNTING. 



the wound, and a single streak of crimson is sufficient to betray all 

 you want to know. 



" A flower thus stained, to the hunter brings 



More joy than the reddest rose ; 

 It telleth a tale, to his heart as dear 

 As the blush that doth all disclose." 



Once I remember shooting at a wild boar, and, on going to the spot, 

 found only that he had passed on into the wood. A beater who, like 

 myself, was also looking about, called to me that I had missed, and 

 showed me, in proof of his assertion, the hole my bullet had torn in 

 a young pine close by. But even this did not convince me, and I 

 still followed the track of the boar. At some distance I found bristles 

 on the snow, and a little further the boar also, quite dead, but no 

 blood anywhere except on the spot where he lay, although the ball 

 had passed right through the body before entering the tree. 



But the strangest sight I remember to have witnessed occurred 

 with a fallow-deer a buck. I came suddenly upon him while graz- 

 ing in a glade, and fired. I looked to see the result of my shot, but 

 he neither fell, nor dashed away. In a moment he began rocking to 

 and fro where he stood. I went towards him, but he took no notice 

 of my approach, and continued the rocking motion as before. I 

 pushed him with my hand, and he rolled over and was dead. The 

 shot-hole was quite round, and showed no redness, not the least 

 sign of blood was visible, and the opening was filled up by the chewed 

 grass on which the animal had been feeding. 



