AN UNSUCCESSFUL EXPERIMENT. 73 



denied me, because the handkerchief became so wet it only smeared 

 the glasses when I tried to use it. I was forced finally to put them 

 down low on my nose and make the best of it, looking over the tops 

 of them. And then the rain hit my eyes, which are none too strong 

 anyway, and I confess to being just a little cross. 



We lunched at half past one, where a very uncomfortable, wet, soggy 

 bank only partly sheltered us from the storm, and then we went on 

 in a \vide swing that brought us into Glen Muick, a mile or more 

 below where I killed my first stag. Here John discovered deer and 

 led a good stalk which brought us into a burn of no great size run- 

 ning between walls six to eight feet high. We went down this until 

 we came within 225 yards of a fine stag, lying down among a mixed 

 lot of twenty or more youngsters and hinds. 



When I poked the muzzle of my rifle over the bank through the 

 grass in the direction of the unsuspecting deer, I had to move my 

 head around for a time until my eye could accommodate itself to the 

 'scope. Then it was necessary to change the position of the tube to 

 find the deer. When I did get the instrument pointing toward him, 

 the magnification was such that I could actually see his eyes as he 

 lay facing me, while his breast below the head seemed to me an 

 ample mark for an accurate rifle fitted with the telescopic sight. 



With this thought in mind, I carefully centered the cross hairs on 

 a little lighter colored spot which seemed about the middle of his 

 chest, and gently pulled the trigger. I was so astounded when the 

 stag went up and ran away that for several seconds I failed to snap 

 in a loaded cartridge and then again I was remiss because I forgot all 

 about the open sight which lay alongside the 'scope, and frantically 

 hunted for my stag through the lenses. 



It was no use. I never found that stag through the telescope and 

 I had to content myself with John's sympathetic remark that it was 

 "always verra hard to shoot a staug lyin' doon." 



Later on the same afternoon I caught sight of a deer down hill 

 to our left. That was 600 yards away. Just the upper part of his 

 horns I could pick out, and from where we were upon sloping 

 grassland with no concealment except that offered by the folds of the 

 ground, there was no chance to see more without exposing ourselves 



