FOLLOWING 
THE DEER^ 
ing their own beads instead of yielding 
xvii 
them tip to a taxidermist to make a mon 
strosity of — for which I am now heart ii 
glad. For the most wonderful lesson of 
all that year's keen hunting was that an 
animars life is vastly more interesting 
than his death, and that of all the joys of 
the chase the least is the mere killing. 
This is more general among hunters 
than the world supposes. I have never yet 
met an old sportsman worthy of the name, 
who has not, sooner or later, gone through 
with much the same experience and learned 
the same lesson, and who does not carry 
about with him, under his canvas jacket, 
the symptoms of a changed heart. 
On this ground I venture to hope that 
my big buck may be followed indulgently 
