60 VERTEBRATE FAUNA OF LAKELAND 



one was chased into West-water and drowned, within the 

 memory of several persons living [circa 1794].' 1 



Housman says : ' Nicolson and Burn make mention of a large 

 forest of deer, which extended from hence (Wasdale Head) to 

 Sty-head in Borrowdale ; but I neither saw nor heard any account 

 of deer in my passage over that alpine tract.' 2 



Dickinson found traditions of the Red Deer of Ennerdale still 

 existing among the dalesmen of his young days. He states that 

 in the early part of the present century a reliable old dalesman 

 told him that before the Eed Deer were destroyed in the Crown 

 Forest of Ennerdale, sheep used occasionally to venture upon 

 the Pillar Stone in search of a chance bite of grass, while the 

 Deer occupied the surrounding forest during the latter half of 

 the previous century. Some of the old stags also chose the 

 same elevated stand as a look-out. If they found a sheep or two 

 in possession they invariably forked them over the side, treating 

 them to a fall of about 200 feet. To prevent such losses the 

 shepherds assembled at the place, and handed stones from one 

 to another along the dangerous entrance neck, and had a wall 

 built high enough to prevent the ingress of sheep and deer. 3 



I am indebted to the Rev. Joshua Tyson, the present vicar of 

 Ennerdale, for kind assistance in ascertaining whether any tradi- 

 tions of the Red Deer are current in Ennerdale in 1892. Mr. 

 Tyson finds that an aged parishioner named Daniel Walker, a 

 native of Loweswater, but who has resided in Ennerdale for the 

 last sixty years, has a clear recollection of hearing the old folk of 

 his youth talking of the Red Deer which once lived on their 

 fells. According to Mr. Walker, the Red Deer used to be 

 plentiful once on what is called ' The Side,' then thickly wooded, 

 but now all cut down. This is situated on the south side of 

 Ennerdale Lake, and their depredations almost ruined the 

 farmers at Gillerthwaite, at the top of the lake, and also at Mire- 

 side Farm on the east side, and they had to put old scythes and 

 pitchforks in the gaps and open places in the fences to keep 

 them out of the crops. ' The Side Wood ' joined Coupland, and 

 ran up to Wasdale Fell, and was under the lord of the manor of 



1 History of Cumberland, vol. i. p. 580. 2 lb. cit. vol. i. p. 580 note. 

 3 Cumbriana, p. 178. 



