HUNTING THE WILD FALLOW DEER. 435 



in the green, green wood; but it is not always as rapid and 

 ready a process as in the open. Deer and hounds could give 

 us any weight among the timber or else we were too slow 

 at the drop of the flag. In a quarter of a mile they were 

 outside the Inclosure ; and as we hurried forth through a gate- 

 way, they were clean out of sight across the sunlit heather and 

 holly. But the next ridge was fully manned by skirmishers, 

 reserving themselves for the chase proper, and declining to 

 waste their strength upon preliminary tufting. So there were 

 halloa and signal to set the huntsman right ; and information 

 manifold to set him wrong or at all events thinking, and 

 digesting. One man had seen three does, another had seen 

 four : a third had seen two bucks and two does : but, oddly 

 enough, no one seemed to have seen three bucks. However 

 Allen galloped on, to news of sight and note of hound, and 

 presently, the great buck bounced across his path and, a 

 minute later, the two couple were caught up and on leash, 

 Moonstone dropping to word like a well-broken setter. But 

 somehow the deer got together again, consultation and new 

 action had to be resorted to, eventually tufting began again, 

 and once more the big fallow buck was set going. Without 

 detailing the process further, suffice it to tell that, at about 

 2.45, Allen had his buck fairly separated, and Mr. Lovell gave 

 the word to lay on. A curious occurrence verified the hunts- 

 man's impression, and went to justify the signal. The deer, in 

 jumping the iron-bound fence into an Inclosure, had knocked 

 off both his antlers, and there they lay, that who would might 

 witness, and as if he had stripped for the fray. Nor is the 

 occurrence so singular as it may seem. Remember, this is the 

 month of May, when every buck is shedding his horns ; and 

 when he is often known to drop them during the fury of the 

 chase. Sometimes he will be viewed into a wood a lordly buck, 

 and be described on his exit as a fat doe. For without his 

 antlered honours who shall tell him by a distant glance ? And 

 so it was to-day. Hounds changed somewhere ; but no one 

 knew exactly where ; and in the end they killed a doe. 



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