332 A STALK AND A KILL 



The next day my orders were to go out again with 

 McLeay on the South Glen, and we only saw one stag 

 worth trying for, which we killed after an exciting 

 stalk ; for just as we were getting up to it I saw the 

 tracker too close to my heels when crawling, and I 

 raised my hand to warn it back. The poor brute was 

 rheumatic, and feared that I was going to strike him, 

 and gave a howl, and so frightened the stag, which I 

 had just got within shot of. We, however, let matters 

 settle themselves as best they could and kept out of 

 sight, and after a time the hinds which were with this 

 stag became quiet, and settled down to feed in the 

 next corrie, where I got an easy stalk and knocked 

 him over. 



Strange to say, every stag I fired at that week 

 dropped in his tracks, except one, which the trackers 

 soon brought to bay in about two hundred yards, when 

 I finished it. The body of this stag was a good one, 

 but the head poor ; and they are, as a rule, very poor 

 in this forest. 



My last day was a very disappointing one, for we 

 came across the track of a very fine stag ; but after 

 following it for an hour or two we never got a sight of 

 it, though it was on just before us, and the track was 

 actually rising where it was held by the wet grass. 

 We made certain of finding this stag in a fine corrie, 

 where a lot of hinds without a stag had been feeding 

 the day before ; but when we reached the corrie, 

 keeping the march, to our disgust we found a man at 

 work at the fence. No wonder there was not a deer 

 to be seen ! We asked him if he had seen the stag, 

 and he replied, ' Well that, for she came just by me 

 before seeing me.' The wretch ! I fear our language 



