36 CHAMOIS HUNTING. 



was getting dark, it was useless to attempt to follow the 

 track of the stag. And in a state of mind which only 

 a person who has been in a like situation can understand, 

 vexed and dissatisfied with myself, I set off towards the 

 hut. Here the matter was thought and talked over again 

 and again. 



" Well, being moonlight, at two o'clock in the morn- 

 ing I started again to try and get a shot at the stags 

 that were belling on all sides, and when it was day, 

 went with the forester to show him where the stag lay, 

 that he might have it fetched and carried down. 



" You know the feeling when you think it is not pos- 

 sible to have missed, and how you still keep on looking 

 for a drop of blood, and still hope on against hope. And 

 so it was with me now; and I could not help going 

 again, though of course it seemed useless, to follow the 

 track of the second stag. But nothing was to be seen 

 more than on the day before. Not a blade of grass, not 

 a stone that my eyes did not carefully examine. And 

 so I went on peering and peering, when only think, sud- 

 denly I see a drop of blood on the ground. It seemed 

 to be too much good fortune to be real, and I therefore 

 did not halloo to the foresters, but still went on step by 

 step, looking carefully on the earth. Now another red drop 

 is seen, and on the same side; and presently traces of the 

 blood having spirted out on both sides, showing clearly 

 that the bullet had gone right through him. 



" I was just on the point of turning back to commu- 

 nicate the glad intelligence to the foresters, when the 

 voices of persons approaching from below reached me, 

 causing me to look round to see who was coming. I at 

 once recognized them : they were the men I had ordered 

 when in the hut, to wait at a certain spot to fetch away 

 my first stag. I could not see them, but I heard one 



