72 RECREATIONS OF A NATURALIST 



each measured length. His measure then would 

 be so many "bow rakes." 



But to return to our " deer-leap." A con- 

 tributor to Notes and Queries (2nd sen iii., p. 137), 

 writing in 1857, says : — 



" Some few years ago I attended the perambula- 

 tion of a manor in Devonshire. In the course of 

 our proceedings we came to one side of the manor, 

 the boundary of which from time immemorial was a 

 ' deer's leap ' from the visible and actual boundary 

 (a bank and wall) which separated the manor we 

 were perambulating from another, i.e., the rights 

 of the adjoining manor extended a ' deer's leap ' 

 into the one we were perambulating. 



" There were many conflicting opinions as to the 

 distance of a ' deer's leap,' but it was eventually 

 decided to dig a spit of turf, as is the usual custom 

 on such occasions, 24 feet from the bank and wall." 



He adds : " I have it from a friend well versed 

 in business of this nature that the distance of a 

 deer's leap is in some districts 24 feet, in others 

 12 feet." 



Another writer in the same volume of that use- 

 ful periodical (iii., p. 195), says : — 



" The term ' deer-leap ' or ' buck-leap ' was 

 generally applied to a narrow strip of land adjoin- 

 ing to and running round the outside of the paling 

 or fence of an ancient park. The breadth of this 

 strip was the distance which it was supposed a deer 

 could leap at one bound ; hence its name." 



He adds : " The remains of what was said to be 

 part of the ' buck-leap ' at Shirley Park, Derbyshire, 



