216 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



easily counted. A scarce print of this, of which I am fortunate 

 enough to possess a copy, was published in 1745. It is engraved 

 by F. Vivares from a painting by T. Smith, and measures, 

 without the margin, 20J in. by 15 in. The inscription is, *A 

 view in Lyme Park (with that extraordinary custom of driving 

 the stags), the property of Peter Legh, Esq., to whom this plate 

 is inscribed by his most humble servant, T. Smith.' In the 

 middle distance the deer are seen swimming the pool, their heads 

 only above water; in the foreground three have landed, two of 

 which, rearing upon their hind legs, are playfully striking at one 

 another with their fore feet ; on the further side of the pool 

 Mr. Legh and his lady, mounted on horseback and accompanied 

 by the park-keeper, Joseph Watson, also mounted, are contem- 

 plating the scene, while beyond them we get a glimpse of the great 

 vale of Cheshire and Lancashire extending to the Rivington Hills 

 in the far distance. 



" How long this custom continued to be observed I know not, 

 though the present owner of the park might be able to say ; but 

 we may assume that it survived, at all events, until the death of 

 the park-keeper, Joseph Watson above named. It is recorded on 

 a monument at Disley that the art of driving the deer was first 

 perfected by him, and that he died in 1753, at the age of 104, 

 having been park-keeper at Lyme more than sixty-four years. 

 Shirley, who mentions this circumstance in his ' Account of 

 English Deer Parks' (1867, p. 207), adds that Watson once 

 undertook, at the bidding of his master, to drive twelve brace of 

 stags to Windsor Forest for a wager of 500 guineas, which he 

 performed accordingly. 



" This custom, however, of driving the deer was not confined 

 to Lyme Park, as may be gathered from Dr. Whitaker's remarks 

 concerning Townley, the seat of a collateral line of the Legh family 

 in the adjoining county of Lancaster. See Ormerod's * Cheshire,' 

 vol. ii. p. 339. 



" Playford also, in his ' Introduction to the Skill of Music,' 

 1655, referring to the fondness of deer for musical sounds, relates 

 that, travelling some years previously in Cambridgeshire, he met 

 on the road near Royston a herd of about twenty bucks, which 

 were following a bagpipe and violin, and in this manner, he says, 

 they were brought out of Yorkshire to Hampton Court. Long 

 before that date, however, Edmund Bert, in his ' Treatise of 





