NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS. 39 



at once, and thus gain the full advantage of the summer grazing. 

 It is in spring that those cold east winds prevail, often accom- 

 panied by hot sun in the day time, which parch the ground and 

 give it a white, desert-like appearance. A well-wintered stag must 

 be better able to stand this particularly trying period of the year 

 than one which has only just been able to pull through the cold 

 north-westerly blasts of wind bringing sleet, snow, or rain, which 

 may not improbably have formed with little interruption the 

 weather of the past four months." 



Stag-hunting, by the Viscount Ebrington, transports us to 

 Devon and Somerset, where it "is the only survival in England 

 of a sport which was followed in earlier days in most countries 

 in Europe, and which still has many devotees on the Continent." 

 The total head of deer in this locality is estimated by the author 

 at about four hundred, while the average number killed for the 

 last ten seasons is sixty. Although sport is there again the 

 principal theme, there are scattered notes of the greatest interest 

 to the naturalist. Thus : — " Something is to be learned also from 

 the feeding of the deer. If the bark of a tree or the ivy growing 

 on it is gnawed up and down, it is the work of a hind ; but if the 

 bites are across the trunk they are a stag's." Again: — " A stag 

 crosses his legs right and left in walking, while with a hind the 

 prints of the hind foot will be in a direct line" with those of the 

 fore foot unless she is heavy in calf; and it is curious, seeing how 

 careful Nature is to protect animals in that condition, that they 

 should in anything resemble the male at that period. The extra 

 weight on the legs is no doubt the reason, and at calving time 

 the stags are defenceless too, having shed their horns." Another 

 query of interest is, " What becomes of the old deer ? They are 

 not all killed by the hounds ; a few may meet with foul play, but 

 some must die a natural death. Yet it is hardly ever that their 

 bodies are found." 



The fourth section of the volume is devoted to " The Cookery 

 of Venison," a subject of importance to every right-thinking 

 naturalist and sportsman, but one outside discussion in these 

 pages. 



