DEER 109 



delighting an immense concourse at Cobhani, where we had 

 met by invitation of the Master of Old Surrey and the 

 farmers of that sporting part of the world. We were nearly 

 forty miles from kennels, and hounds and horses had to sleep 

 out. After the stag had been outlying two or three weeks, 

 I sent the hounds to try to catch him, as we could not 

 afford to be without so good a stag. They found him on the 

 hills above Boxmoor, and ran him fast for an hour and a half 

 in a most distressing country for horses, having to whip off 

 in consequence. Lord Clanwilliam, however, behaved mag- 

 nanimously, and having seen the hounds out of sight retired 

 into the porch of a limekiln. Some children saw him stand- 

 ing there and rushed off' to tell their father, who was anchored 

 in a neighbouring public-house. But, according to the 

 account given me, it was nearly four hours before anything 

 was done by the company in the public-house to secure him. 

 The porchway was, however, eventually blocked up. Lord 

 Clanwilliam having been good enough to remain there the 

 whole of the time. I saw this deer two or three days later 

 at Swinley, looking very well, but not in such good condition 

 as before he lay out. 



Loss of condition is always involved in lying out. If 

 they gain in wildness they lose in wind and muscle. An 

 outlying deer is a bad neighbour. They are wasteful feeders, 

 and the lean tillage about Bagshot and Bracknell would 

 quickly suffer if many deer were left out. I remember 

 an outlying deer behaving very badly to the asters and 

 carnations in a villa garden, and I am bound to say the 

 massacre of domestic picotees and malmaisons by a so-called 

 wdld animal would quite have justified a Berkshire adaptation 

 of Ansdell's ' ' Crofter's Revenge ' from the best bedroom 

 window. 



In the paddocks the stronger stags hustle the weaker, and 

 a good deal of bullying goes on. There is always a master deer. 



