PREFACE. 



" SHALL a poaching, hunting, hawking 'squire presume to 

 trespass on the fields of literature ? " These words, or 

 others of similar import, I remember to have encountered 

 in one of our most distinguished reviews. They ring still 

 in my ears, and fill me with apprehension as it is ; but 

 they would alarm me much more if I had attempted to 

 put my foot within the sacred enclosures alluded to. These 

 are too full of spring traps for my ambition, and I see 

 " this is to give notice " written in very legible characters, 

 and take warning accordingly. 



Literature ? Heaven help us ! far from it ; I have no 

 such presumption ; I have merely attempted to describe a 

 very interesting pursuit as nearly as possible in the style 

 and spirit in which I have always seen it carried on. Ten 

 years' successful practice in the forest of Atholl have 

 enabled me to enter into all the details that are connected 

 with deer-stalking. That it is a chase which throws all 

 our other field-sports far in the background, and, indeed 

 makes them appear wholly insignificant, no one who has 



