266 SPORTING ADVENTURES 



taking- deliberate aim, he fired at the heart, and when the 

 smoke cleared away we beheld the herd scampering off at full 

 speed. When he saw his quarry going as fast as the others 

 he burst into a vigorous expletive, and said he was sure the 

 buck must be an enchanted one, or he would not have missed 

 him twice in succession. 



As every hunter knows a stag that nothing can kill, and 

 defies every stratagem planned for his destruction, I was rather 

 amused at his apparent sincerity of expression, and asked him 

 if he had ever known or heard of an enchanted stag-; and he re- 

 plied that while he did not believe in enchantment, except when 

 exercised by woman's eyes, he was positively sure that there 

 was an occasional buck that no person could hit with an 

 ordinary rifle, and he felt certain that this was one of that 

 class. While this conversation was taking place we were 

 moving rapidly after the runaways, but before we had pro- 

 ceeded five hundred yards he gave an exclamation of surprise, 

 slapped his right thigh vehemently, and said in the most 

 emphatic manner, " By Jerusalem ! I've got him ; he aint 

 enchanted after all." On looking at the ground I saw several 

 large drops of blood, and following them up we came upon the 

 stag in a clump of bushes. He was perieetly dead, and by 

 the manner in which he lay we presumed he had received a 

 wound in the heart. An examination revealed this fact, and 

 also that a rifle-ball had struck the under portion of his tail, as 

 it was cut, though not deeply, from the tip to nearly the root. 



After my friend had exhausted his joy at having killed such 

 a tough customer, he said he would pardon him now for waving 

 his tail at him, for that almost any critter would hoist his flag 

 when it was stung like that. We treated this one as we had 

 the last, but, instead of hanging it we cached it on a huge 

 boulder, to keep it safe from wolves and bears. 



Our next move was to clamber towards the summit of the 

 mountain, but always beating to the windward, as we did not 

 want to lose any chances, and the deer were apparently so 

 plentiful, and so little hunted, that we were anxious to secure 

 venison enough to last for some time. We trudged along for 

 an hour or more, but saw none, though their sluts were visible 



