DEER-STALKING. 13 



superior in size and qualities to that of our times. 

 We find from horns that have been dug up in several 

 parts of Scotland, that some large species of deer 

 must even have become extinct. Within how short 

 or how long a space of time, it would appear difficult 

 to determine. Portions of what are supposed to be 

 an enormous variation of the stag, have been also 

 discovered, at various intervals, in the mud beds and 

 bogs of Ireland. The horns of the Irish elk are 

 said to have measured five feet from the tips 

 to the roots, with an expansion of near eleven feet ! 

 It is easy for the mind to picture the British Isles 

 of the days of yore, as an aggregate of forest and 

 moorland, thinly be-scattered by the habitations of 

 man, while the beasts of the field out-numbered, by 

 countless hosts, the hairs of his head. And bring- 

 ing our view infinitely more within the focus of exa- 

 mination, we still find the stag one of the most 

 numerous of the families of animals, and the undis- 

 puted lord of its herds. The general hunting matches 

 of the Norman era prove the multitudes of deer 

 ranging at will in the royal chaces ; a thousand have 

 been killed at a single match. A hunting establish- 

 ment of these days was, indeed, a regal affair, encom- 

 passed with ceremonies, embarrassed with etiquettes, 

 and attended with distinctions, more gravely important 

 to the chieftains of those ages than we can now 

 altogether comprehend. No doubt, also, if the red 

 deer was then larger, the races of men were superior 

 in size and muscular power, and more hardy than at 



