THE DEER HUNT. 57 



a sound, and, save now and then a fox-squirrel, we met no animal 

 life, until we came to the hummocks, and drew together to give 

 general directions for commencing the chase, the manner of which 

 is necessary to explain. I 



A hummock is* a thicket often covering but an acre or two of 

 land, and sometimes presenting an extent of several miles. The 

 one now in view covered about thirty acres, and half a mile farther 

 down the woods, we could see another. It lay in a low swale of 

 land, and in it the haw, the alder, and willow, grew into a tangled 

 copse, studded with the red leaves of the pinckneya, while above 

 them all, a hundred feet or more, the ash and gum-trees reared 

 their long arms, and the magnolia opened its blossoms to the 

 upper air. It was an admirable spot for game, with succulent 

 grass and flags, and a dusky shade that was but little penetrated 

 by the sun. 



" You stay here, Doctor Pollock," said Jackson, as we rode up ; 

 " and mind your eyes, sir." 



The Doctor drew himself up with a doubtful air, as if uncer- 

 tain whether minding his eyes referred to the uses he had just 

 been putting those organs to in watching Miss Jackson's face, or 

 whether it referred to watchfulness in the future ; so he answered 

 at random, " All right, sir ! " 



" And you, sir," he continued, turning to me, " take your place 

 two gun-shots off on that side, keeping always within five or six 

 rods of the swamp. And you," turning to the neighbour that had 

 joined us, " go on next ; and you, Lou, come with Mike and me." 



And away they cantered, with the dogs, around the other side 

 of the swamp, dropping one or two negroes, as they passed, to 

 guard some particular point of the hummock, and in this way we 

 enclosed two sides of the swamp with a cordon of hunters stationed 

 just so far apart that if a deer came out, one or the other of the 

 hunters in waiting was certain of a shot. On the further side, and 

 the only portion of the swamp that we were unable to surround, 

 the drivers were to enter with the hounds, and the deer would not 

 be likely to make his escape in that direction. The deer in 

 Florida and the other southern states are the ordinary Virginia 

 deer, but of small size, the bucks weighing an average of an hundred 



