92 STAG-Hl'XriNG RECOLLECTIONS 



CHAPTEE V 



DEER 



Foot-people staring and horse-men preparing, 



Now there's a murmur, a stir, and a shout, 

 Fresh from his carriage as bridegroom in marriage 



The Lord of the Valley leaps gallantly out. 



Successful stag-hunting depends upon two things — the 

 condition and the humour of the deer you hunt. I put these 

 in front even of country — upon which I have laid stress else- 

 where—and very much in front of scent. Anxiety about 

 the latter need never keep the stag-hunter awake. Some 

 days of course there will be a better scent than others ; 

 every now and then circumstances, the only ' force majeure ' 

 which besets stag-hunting, may run you out of scent. But 

 there is always scent enough for hounds to hunt a carted 

 deer on days when they could not own a fox. I have often 

 seen the Queen's Hounds make up what seemed an impossible 

 leeway. As Davis said to Mr. Bowen May, ' The scent 

 of a deer is much sweeter.' Country, as I have already said, 

 I rank very high. It would be madness to start a pack of 

 staghounds in many parts of nineteenth-century England 

 which are hunted by foxhounds. But the condition and the 

 temperament of your deer— for perhaps it is temperament 

 rather than humour — come before country. Given these, 

 and given anything approaching a decent country within a 

 two-mile radius of your turn out— surely a very moderate 

 postulate— you are all right. ' An amiable deer,' as the deer- 



