io8 DEER-STALKING 



conditions vary so greatly as is the case here. If the 

 whole country had been afforested for many years, 

 and no change from sheep to deer or -vice versa had 

 taken place, it would be easy to determine the 

 relative proportion of stags and hinds which ought to 

 be shot ; but where new forests are being formed, each 

 case must be judged according to the circumstances 

 which prevail. It has been already observed that 

 these new forests get stocked sometimes with a large 

 proportion of stags, sometimes with a numerical 

 superiority of hinds. If the latter, then it is clear 

 these hinds must come from the adjoining forests, 

 which are thus proportionately depleted, and few 

 need then be killed until the process comes to a 

 natural end. The theory here put forward is 

 obviously sound, and I have myself tested it in 

 practice. The average number of hinds which have 

 been killed on the ground here (cleared and sheep 

 ground) during the last thirty years has not exceeded 

 half that of stags. We have no reason to suspect 

 any poaching beyond an occasional deer on the sea 

 coast in winter and yet there is no overcrowding of 

 hinds, and the part of the ground which was always 

 forest has, if anything, fewer of them than when I 

 first came, and on none of it are there too many. In 

 the older and larger forests which are not affected by 



