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CHAPTER IV. 



THE STAG IN THE HUTTING SEASON. 



Having alluded to the stag during the rutting season, it 

 is as well perhaps to add a few words on this subject for 

 the information of those uninitiated in the mysteries of 

 woodcraft. 



On the feast of St. Egidius, 1st of September, the 

 rutting season is said to begin. Thus it is, at least, ac- 

 cording to the old sayings of those practised in the noble 

 art of Venerie. The stag leaves the deep recesses of the 

 forest and comes forth to the skirts of the woods, and is 

 seen even by day in the glades and coppices. The good 

 pasture of the summer months has made him sleek, and the 

 blood begins to flow through his full veins with a more 

 impetuous current. Like the youth who has bloomed 

 into manhood, and who looks around him with a brighter 

 eye than heretofore, the stag now gazes dauntlessly in all 

 the pride of vigorous strength, and his bold front seems 

 almost to challenge to the attack. He who ere this has 

 dwelt like a recluse in the forest solitudes, now comes 

 forth into the noonday world ; away he bounds, and be- 

 fore the morning dawns he is in another territory ; he 

 has traversed the valleys and has toiled up the steep 

 mountain-sides, and, bearing away for the well-known 

 open glade in the beech-forest, has reached it before the 



