64 FOREST CREATURES. 



the brow antler, or the high embattlement of the crown 

 is each year but a fac-simile of the preceding one. The 

 beam is stronger, the points are larger and more nume- 

 rous, but the characteristic features are minutely the same. 

 Such good stags are always known to the sportsman 

 and the keepers by some particular name or designation ; 

 an epithet relating either to the haunt of the animal, or 

 being an allusion to some circumstance, trivial, perhaps, 

 but still well remembered by the hunter, intimately 

 connected with the noble creature. Now he will bear 

 the name of the sportsman, who after many a weary- 

 watching at last met him at early morning, and, owing to 

 some mistake, or from flurry or awkwardness, missed him 

 after all. Or he will be called after his favourite haunt, 

 and known to all as " the Eocky Grlen stag." Perhaps, 

 years ago, a bullet intended to bring him down may have 

 merely grazed a limb, leaving however a certain lame- 

 ness ; and hence he will be talked of as " the limper " 

 by every forester and gillie of the district. Nor is it 

 impossible that the formation of his antlers may have 

 left a deep impression on him who saw him first ; and 

 in the enthusiastic description of such magnificence 

 some expression was perhaps made use of which elicited 

 a roar of laughter from the assembled party. In recol- 

 lection of the circumstance, that word which called forth 

 such merry burst will be connected indissolubly with 

 the particular stag, and he will henceforth bear it to his 



