412 CHAMOIS HUNTING. 



bring it down. I have sometimes met one in the wood 

 running away from some real or imaginary danger ; and 

 it was quite pitiable to see its condition, agitated and 

 exhausted with exertion, the exquisitely fine limbs trem- 

 bling beneath its body, and its flanks palpitating as it 

 gasped for breath : every movement showed how little its 

 fragile form was able to endure any unwonted rough- 

 ness. The chamois is less susceptible than the roe, but 

 a wound soon makes it sicken ; when struck, it will im- 

 mediately climb to some solitary spot, and there remain. 

 If by chance you shoot one that still carries traces of a 

 former wound in the body, you may be sure it was slight 

 and of little importance. But chamois even, as well as 

 red- deer, often get bad falls ; and the antlers of the one 

 and the horns of the other frequently bear evidence of a 

 headlong tumble over the rocks. 



In old works on Venery strange stories are related 

 about the habits of animals of chase.* In former days 

 the pursuit of the stag and wild-boar was a royal pas- 

 time, and those animals which afforded such noble sport 

 were on that account elevated to a rank above the more 

 common brutes. They were — without offence be it said 

 — the aristocracy of the animal creation. For in bar- 

 barous times the attributes of the sovereign are always 

 exaggerated ; and, as " the fountain of honour," his en- 

 nobling influence is extended to the elephant that carries 

 him, the steeds that draw his chariot, and even to the 

 beasts of the forest which he happens to take especial 



* " Plutarch lias put the question, Why the flesh of a sheep bitten by 

 a wolf be more agreeable to the palate ? And he says that it happeneth 

 because a wolf's breath is so hot and fiery, that the hardest bone in 

 its body will become soft and tender. Therefore the flesh which his 

 breath hath touched becometh soft and tender. On this account the 

 dainty livers of olden times strove to obtain sheep that had been torn 

 by a wolf." — Abraham Santa Clara. 



