THE RED DEER 
I knew that the chase could not last much longer, so spurred myself to 
redoubled efforts. 
The stag if wounded badly was sure to bay soon, as he had kept straight 
down hill from the moment of firing the shot. I stumbled on and on, and 
could not see far into the valley, but no sign of hound or stag were there, 
till at last exhausted Nature forced me to call a halt. I kept stopping and 
listening, and at last began to retreat up hill in no very happy frame of 
mind. Hardly had I done so when almost beneath my feet I heard the faint 
bay of the retriever. For some time I could see nothing and then dis- 
covered the dog and stag hidden under an overhanging peat-hag in the 
swollen burn. It was some moments before I could obtain a shot, as 
the dog kept barking with his head within a foot of the stag’s nose, the 
bodies of both being completely submerged in the pool. 
Thus ended a day of excitement which I always remember with the 
greatest pleasure. 
In early and mid-Victorian days misfires and the doubtful accuracy and 
weak penetration of rifles always added many thrilling incidents to the 
stalk. Young Robertson (son of the stalker who is holding the hounds in 
“ The Deer Drive ”) and Donald McLeish, who as gillies had stalked with 
Landseer, told me that the great artist was a very poor shot, and was, in 
fact, always so intensely excited when he came near deer that he almost 
Invariably missed. He was, however, frequently in at the death of many a 
noble hart that the deerhounds bayed. The incident of “ The Stag at Bay ” 
was an actual scene. Landseer fired at and missed a very fine royal on the 
slopes of Ben Toig, just above where the present Forest Lodge now stands. 
The two best hounds in the kennel were loosed by Peter Robertson and 
ran the stag into the waters of Loch Tulla, where they held it at bay in an 
arm of the lake which is to-day much the same as when the artist painted 
it. After some time Landseer came up and killed the stag, which had badly 
injured one of the dogs, which is seen wallowing on its back in the lake. 
I once killed a stag almost on the spot where Landseer painted “ The Deer 
Drive.” It is situated on the high pass between the great corries of Alta- 
hourn and Larig Dochart in the forest of the Black Mount, two of the finest 
corries in Scotland for deer and for wild mountain scenery. Both in the 
late Marquis of Breadalbane’s and Lord Dudley’s time it was the practice 
to drive the Altahourn corrie, if the wind was from the west. The deer 
always climbed the hill faces in the same way, converging at the top on one 
small pass, which two rifles could easily command, and could shoot as 
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