88 MY LAST STAG AND THE QUAGMIRE. 



glad enough, the next clay being Sunday, to take a rest. 

 On the Monday, with one of my Dutch friends, we started 

 at four a.m. for the same ground, and were more fortunate. 

 I bowled over a good stag at a hundred and fifty yards, and 

 dropped another on his tracks at a hundred and eighty 

 yards, my companion also killing a fine young stag. Just 

 before giving up for the day I saw a stag moving away in 

 the high grass ; he stood for a moment and I took a steady 

 aim ; on the ball striking him he sprung up in the air and 

 fell over on his back, but when I got to the place to my 

 astonishment he was gone ; we followed on his tracks, and 

 we could see by the footmarks that he had dashed into a 

 deep quagmire where, from the bubbles which were rising, 

 it was evident that he had been completely swallowed up. 



So ended my sport in Java, often carried on under great 

 difficulties, principally from the fear constantly present 

 amongst the natives and those conducting the beats that I 

 might come to some kind of grief either by being bagged 

 by a tiger or from some other cause, for which they would 

 be made responsible. 



Game exists in abundance, particularly deer and hogs. 

 The deer are smaller than the Indian sambur, more like 

 our Red deer in colour, but with the same number of tines 

 on the antlers as the sambur. The stags have a habit 

 of collecting masses of reeds and swamp grass on their 

 antlers which gives them a fierce look as well as a very 

 remarkable appearance when a number of them are moving 

 together. There is only one locality in the neighbourhood 

 of Cheribon, where the Axis or spotted deer is found in a 

 wild state, but they are often kept in enclosures in the same 

 manner as our fallow deer. If the grass had been burnt 



