DEER STALKING. 323 



a sea-fowl in speed he will outstrip the race- 

 horse and in the height and length of his leap 

 "none but himself can be his parallel!" The 

 anxiety attending this sport must be as intense 

 as the pursuit is laborious. After climbing for 

 hours the mountain-side, with the torrent thunder- 

 ing down the granite crags above him, and fearful 

 chasms yawning beneath him,* the stalker, with his 

 glass, at length descries in some remote valley, a 

 herd too distant for the naked eye. He now de- 

 scends into the tremendous glen beneath, fords the 

 stream, wades the morass, and by a circuitous route 

 threads the most intricate ravines to avoid giving 

 the deer the wind.- Having arrived near the brow 

 of the hill, on the other side of which he believes 

 them to be, he approaches on hands and knees, or 

 rather vernacularly, and his attendant, with a spare 

 rifle, does the same. A moment of painful sus- 

 pense ensues. He may be within shot of the herd, 

 or they may be many miles distant, for he has not 

 had a glimpse of them since he first discovered them 

 an hour ago. His videttes on the distant hills 

 have hitherto telegraphed no signal of his proximity 

 to deer ; but now a white handkerchief is raised, 

 the meaning of which cannot be mistaken ; with 

 redoubled caution he crawls breathlessly along till 

 the antlers appear ; another moment and he has a 

 view of the herd ; they are within distance. He 

 selects a hart with well-tipt, wide-spreading horns. 

 Still on the ground, and resting his rifle on the 



* An idea of the height and steepness of some of the forest-moun- 

 tains may be formed by the fact, that from a dozen to twenty deer 

 are sometimes destroyed at once by the fall of an avalanche, in winter. 



