A BLANK DAY IX A DEER-FOREST. 



" Nature teaches beasts to know their friends." 



SHAKSPKARE. 



THE more I see of the red deer in their native 

 forests, the more I feel interested in their ways 

 and habits. Indeed, almost every stalk, whether 

 successful or otherwise, affords me some oppor- 

 tunity of admiring that ceaseless watchfulness on 

 the part of the hinds, without the exercise of 

 which the fat and comparatively lazy stags would 

 less frequently escape the rifle. 



During the excitement of my first season, 

 the paramount object was, naturally enough, to 

 compass the death of the animal I was in quest of; 

 and it was not until the novelty of the sport had 

 in some measure worn away, after the acquisition 

 of several good " heads," that I began to derive 

 new pleasure from observing the frequent examples 

 of their marvellous instinct. 



