PREFACE. vii 



deerstalking is so exciting that no excuses need be 

 made for those who cannot from a variety of reasons go 

 further afield. 



Mr. Scrope's book most truly contains a very great 

 deal of valuable information, conveyed also in a style 

 which carries the reader right away on to the mountain 

 tops, and into the burns and peat-bogs he so graphically 

 describes. But Mr. Scrope's book was written a hundred 

 years ago, in the days of single barrel and muzzle-load- 

 ing rifles. Carefully did the present writer study it 

 before he ever levelled his rifle at a stag, and after a 

 short experience of the sport, the idea impressed itself 

 on him that Mr. Scrope had taken for granted his 

 reader would be already acquainted with many small 

 matters connected with it; daily little facts cropped 

 up which were not mentioned in Mr. Scrope's work, 

 but all of which if known would contribute to success ; 

 therefore, without in any way attempting to compete 

 with him, or any of the other mentioned writers, 

 either in style or stalking experience, the writer has 

 thought he could yet be of service to the numbers of 

 young stalkers every year brings to the front. 



Each successive season produces a quota of fresh 

 blood some, the privileged and lucky ones, to join in 

 the sport on actually "cleared" or forested ground; 

 others, the more numerous body, to partake of it on 

 sheep walks marching with some forest ; which ground 

 the deer often prefer for better and sweeter grass, or for 

 greater shelter. On such shootings the deer are usually 



