STAG-HUNTING 



occasionally when hounds are very close to them they 

 make a mistake and fall or jump over heights which 

 are fatal. I can only recall three such occurrences 

 now, and in two out of the three some of the hounds 

 shared the fate of the stag. A most disastrous day- 

 was August 1 8, 1884, when a stag after a good run 

 went down through the woods to Glenthorne. Some 

 of the leading hounds caught a view of him near the 

 house, and raced him across the lawn. There was a 

 path to the sea close by, but in his panic the stag 

 jumped over the cliff, a sheer drop of sixty to eighty 

 feet, and five hounds followed him. The fall on to 

 the stony beach killed the stag and one hound on 

 the spot ; two of the others broke their legs and 

 had to be killed where they lay, but the other two, 

 strange to say, recovered ; one of them remained 

 crippled, but the other was hunting again before the 

 end of October. 



A somewhat similar incident occurred on another 

 occasion, September 23, 1881, but then no hounds were 

 hurt. The third was on a very wild tempestuous day, 

 January 6, 1882. It was impossible to hunt on the moor 

 at the advertised fixture, so the hounds were taken to 

 disturb a distant cover, the farmers about which were 

 complaining. From that they ran what was reported 

 to be a hind to the cliffs near Bossington Point, 



