CHAPTER V 
ANDALUCIA AND ITS BIG GAME 
STILL-HUNTING (RED DEER) 
THE line of least resistance represents twentieth-century ideals— 
maximum results for the minimum of labour or technical skill. 
In the field of sport, wherever available, universal “ driving” super- 
sedes the arts of earlier venery—the pride of past generations. 
In Spain, more leisurely while no less dignified, there survive 
in sport, as in other matters, practices more consonant with the 
dash and chivalry popularly ascribed to her national character. 
Such, for example, is the attack, single-handed, on bear or boar 
with cold steel—dé arma blanca, in Castilian phrase. Here we 
purpose describing the system of ‘ Still-hunting” (Fastreando) as 
practised in Andalucia with a skill that equals the best of the 
American “‘ Red Indian,” and is only surpassed, within our experi- 
ence, by Somalis and Wandorobo savages in East Africa. 
Before day-dawn we are away with our two trackers. Maybe 
it is a lucky morning, and as the first streaks of light illumine 
the wastes, they reveal to our gaze a first-rate stag. In that case 
the venture is vastly simplified. It is merely necessary to allow 
time for the stag to reach his lie-up, and the spoor can be followed 
at once. But barring such exceptional fortune, it is necessary to 
find, or rather to select from amidst infinity of tracks crossing 
and recrossing hither and thither in bewildering profusion the 
trail of such a master-beast as clearly is worthy the labour of 
a long day’s pursuit. Twice and again we follow a spoor for 
100 yards or more over difficult ground before finally deciding 
that its owner is not up to our standard of quality, and the 
interrupted search is resumed. Once found, there is rarely room 
for mistake with a really big spoor. The breadth of heel, the 
length and deep-cut prints of the cloven toes attest both weight 
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