1 54 The Poets Beasts, 



shine." Its grace when first aroused, its haughty flight, its 

 courage when it stands "with hornie bayonnettes at bay" — 



" The chase is up — but they shall know 

 The stag at bay's a desperate foe " — 



are all insisted upon again and again, and the wood-nymphs 

 and the fairies are for ever being called in to help the 

 hunted favourite. 



Its horns — " the stag's large front," as Thomson curiously 

 calls it, or as Denhara, with more enthusiasm — 



" On whose sublime and shady front is reared 

 Nature's great masterpiece " — 



give the stag that unusual stateliness of gait which is fami- 

 liar to all, and which the poets are never tired of admiring. 

 " Stately as a deer with antlers " is Longfellow's simile for 

 surpassing dignity of bearing. They note its growth and 

 renewal, always introduce the antlers in the foremost pas- 

 sage of the description ; and on this point the deer's sup- 

 posed regret at having so " heavy a head " when hunted, 

 they give fancy play. 



Shedding its horns, or, as Surrey says, "hanging his old 

 head on the pale" — unantlered ; "flying to the wood to 

 hide his armless head" (Marvell) — rehorned, "gracefully 

 pacing, the wild-eyed harts, to their traditional tree, to 

 clear the velvet from their budded horns " (Jean Ingelow) 

 — we meet it in every stage. 



Nor do the poets fail to do full justice to that striking epi- 

 sode of the deer's closing life, its retirement into solitude to 

 die — " as the stricken deer withdraws himself alone " — " so 

 the struck deer in some sequestered part lies down to die " 

 — " I was a stricken deer that left the herd, long since " 

 (Cowper). 



" So wings the wounded deer her flight, 

 Pierced by some ambushed archer of the night, 



