TRACKING THE WOUNDED STAG. 361 



The same excellent sportsman whom I have already 

 quoted, — Prince Leiningen, and who for a great part of 

 his life had been accustomed to mountain sport, — once 

 told me he had gained a conviction that mountain stags 

 were much fleeter in their movements than those of the 

 plain. This, he asserted, was especially observable in the 

 rutting season ; and he accounted for it from the cir- 

 cumstance that, the distances being so great, there was 

 so much more ground to be got over, requiring an ad- 

 ditional degree of speed in order to reach the various 

 spots within a reasonable time. The correctness of the 

 opinion was verified to me the following day. In the 

 morning, as we were on the point of starting, we heard 

 the loud, hoarse bellowing of a stag close to the hut. 

 Pie was so close indeed, that, but for the impenetrable 

 darkness, I could have shot him from the threshold. He 

 was still there some time after, when we went forth to- 

 ward the hill- side. Presently we heard him in front of 

 us, and then away to the right : anon he w r as further 

 ahead ; then his voice came rumbling through the pines 

 high, high up on the mountain ; and at last, after climb- 

 ing awhile, we could but just hear it, far away, — a low, 

 almost inaudible murmur. The space he had cleared in 

 that short time was quite extraordinary. 



I determined to try for this stag, and continued to 

 ascend. At last the bellowing grew more distinct, and, 

 no longer continuing to recede, was heard proceeding 

 from the same spot. The stag, which before in passion- 

 ate impatience had been scouring the whole mountain 

 in search of deer, had now, it seemed, found some, and 

 consequently remained where they were. We got nearer 

 and nearer, and the stag's voice now reached our ears 

 with delightful distinctness. His occasional low mut- 

 tering even could be plainly heard. Now there came a 



