IN SCOTCH DEER-FORESTS 73 



game, and give his whereabouts away to the spy-glass 

 on a week-day as he had done on the Sabbath, and 

 thus afford opportunity of a quiet crawl and shot. 

 But not a bit of it. We spied every visible hole and 

 corner of those birch-woods for days after without 

 seeing sign of any deer. Early morning, or late in 

 the evening before the gloaming, it was all the same. 

 The stag kept himself most carefully concealed. So 

 at last we took to driving, and, as it happened, killed 

 a good stag in the further portion of the wood, which 

 was somewhat separated from the main part of the 

 cover, at the very first attempt. But he was not the 

 stag we were after. A decent eight- point beastie of 

 15 stone, no doubt, but, still, not the big one. I had 

 counted every point on the other's horns that Sunday, 

 and they were ten in number, long, wide and heavy, 

 and adorned 18 stone, at least, of sinewy bone and fat 

 venison. 



We prided ourselves on the successful first drive, 

 but, as a matter of cold-blooded fact, the shot and kill 

 on that occasion had been a fluke. The eight-point 

 stag did not go where he was intended to be driven, 

 nor break where expected, to certain rifles of the party 

 placed in posts of honour. On the contrary, he 

 insisted on going back through the drivers, and by 

 the merest chance gave a long stern shot to the writer, 

 posted on the flank of the drive, which said shot, by 

 a greater chance still, happened to come off and kill 

 the unlucky stag. 



Still, it was only a question of time, we thought, to 

 get the bigger beast. A fond hope, never destined to 

 be realized. We drove that wood regularly once a 

 week through September, and no rifleman ever caught 

 glimpse of the stag we wanted. The drivers used 



