THE ISLAND OF HITTEREN 39 



in the disappointment, temporary no doubt, a modi- 

 cum of which is necessary to give added zest and 

 flavour to all forms of wild shooting. 



Incident number one was my first experience of a 

 deer-drive on Hitteren. I was out on Els Fjeld, our 

 favourite stalk ing- ground on the Strom Forest, with 

 a dried-up old Norske hunter named Gabriel Aune, 

 one of our staff, who was well up in all the arts and 

 tricks of our island hunting. We had crept for a mile 

 or more along the steep wooded sides of the fjeld, 

 and seen no deer. The afternoon was getting late. 

 We had come out on the higher fjeld, where the pine- 

 cover ran up into little stunted fir-woods nestling in 

 steep- sided upland valleys. I was thinking that the 

 day's sport was over, when Gabriel, after examining 

 the ground, remarked, ' Skal ve har en leeten klap 

 jagt ?' (Shall we have a little drive ?). I assented 

 readily enough, and he accordingly placed me behind 

 a large rock on an open hillside, and himself disap- 

 peared round the shoulder of the higher open fjeld on 

 my left. He had previously explained to me the plan 

 of campaign, and had doubtless tried the game before 

 in the days when Hitteren natives killed their own 

 deer. This happened to be a favourite spot for a 

 drive. 



In front of my post was open fjeld for some 

 300 yards, across which ran a steep gully, and beyond 

 was a thick wood of stunted fir and birch at the head 

 of a steep-sided valley, a favourite resort for good 

 stags. With a suitable wind the drive was almost a 

 certainty for a shot, provided, of course, that the stag 

 was there. The driver could reach the far side of the 

 wood by going round a steep hill, and there was no 

 more convenient way for a stag to run, if he happened 



