CH. XXV. TRACKS OF DEER. 85 



these animals, I sent a rifle-ball right into her 

 yellow chest as she sat upright with her head turned 

 towards me. 



But time advanced, so I delayed no longer, and 

 started off in a westerly direction. Many a weary 

 mile did I tramp that day without seeing anything 

 but grouse, and an occasional hare. Nevertheless 

 I saw many fresh tracks of red deer : particularly 

 crossing one mossy piece of ground, where there 

 appeared to have been at least twenty or thirty deer, 

 and amongst them one or two large fine stags. In 

 one place I saw a solitary track of a noble stag, but 

 it was two or three days old. I judged that the herd 

 whose tracks I saw had a good chance of being in 

 or about a corrie, a good view of which I should get 

 from the next height ; but after a long and tiresome 

 survey of the ground I could see no living creature, 

 excepting a heron, who was standing in his usual 

 disconsolate attitude on a stone in the burn that ran 

 out of the corrie, adding by his very presence to the 

 solitude of the scene. " I don't understand where 

 these deer can be," was my internal ejaculation, 

 " but here they are not ; so come on, good dog." 

 Another and another height did I pass over, and 

 many a glen did I scan inch by inch till my eyes 

 ached with straining through the glass : nothing 

 could I see, and I began to think to myself that as 



