178 
NOTES ON THE RED DEER. 
[Nature and Art, November 1, 1863. 
that grooms and gentlemen of the turf think large nostrils 
necessary, and a perfection in race-horses.” 
A little further on, Mr. White adds : — 
“ Mr. Pennant has sent me the following curious and 
pertinent reply : — ‘ I was much surprised to find in the 
antelope something analogous to what you mention as re- 
markable in deer. This animal has also a long slit beneath 
each eye, which can be opened and shut at pleasure. On 
holding an orange to one, the creature made as much use 
of these orifices as of his nostrils, applying them to the 
fruit, and seeming to smell it through them.’ ” 
The writer of the present article can bear witness 
to the truth of this assertion, having repeatedly 
noticed it in two domesticated antelopes which he 
had in his possession in South Africa. Not only 
do these spiracula perform the functions above 
described, but by opening an additional communica- 
tion with the olfactory nerve, they contribute to 
that exquisite keenness of scent upon which these 
animals appear so greatly to rely for safety. 
Again, when hard pressed, the. Deer frequently 
takes to the water, or “ soils,” as it is termed in 
“ V enerie.” In these cases a stag will lie down in 
the water, his horns laid flat on his back, and but 
a small portion of the head above water, a position 
in which additional means of respiration are 
doubtless most necessary. On these occasions (we 
may observe), not only is the animal hidden by the 
water, but, in a running stream, the scent will be 
carried down stream, with a rapidity dependent on 
the velocity of the current, and thus almost to a 
certainty mislead his pursuers. 
lied Deer are now nearly extinct in the British 
Islands, save in the Highland deer forests, where 
their preservation has been an undertaking of 
expense and labour. During a severe winter, a 
few seasons back, a Bed Deer was found in the 
north of Yorkshire ; but he, it was supposed, was a 
straggler from one of the deer preserves further 
north ; and we believe we are correct in saying 
that the only spot on this side of the Tweed where 
these animals can now be found, is a small tract of 
limestone country, about forty miles long and fifty 
broad, running along the shores of the Bristol 
Channel, towards the Somersetshire range, known 
as the Quantock Hills, and forming a part of 
Exmoor Forest. 
Some few years since a small remnant of the 
breed also existed on the least-frequented parts 
of the Cumberland Fells ; but a gentleman well 
acquainted with the natural history of the northern 
counties informs the writer that these animals, he 
believes , have now disappeared altogether. Perhaps 
some of our readers may be able to throw additional 
light on this point. 
Many writers assert that Red Deer were in- 
troduced into England from France. They were 
at any rate very abundant as early as the days of 
the Saxons in every part of England. The history 
of the chase at that period is somewhat obscure. 
The Saxons — with whom it was a serious occupa- 
tion, carried on as much to supply the necessaries 
of life as for amusement — appear to have been 
content with driving and trapping the deer. The 
more improved style of “ Venerie,” when the quarry 
was run down with the aid of “ hound and horn,” 
dates from the Norman period, when those large 
portions of country, like the New Forest, were laid 
waste to form royal hunting-grounds. 
A few centuries ago the chase of the deer would 
seem to have possessed more of the danger and 
excitement of actual warfare than we are liow 
accustomed to associate with the pursuit of any 
English game. Sir Walter Scott has thus described 
some of the incidents of the chase in a note to his 
poem of the “ Lady of the Lake” : — - 
“ When the stag turned to bay, the hunter had the 
perilous task of going in upon, and killing or disabling the 
desperate animal. At certain times of the year this was 
held particularly dangerous. It was at all times a task to 
be adventured on wisely and warily, either by getting 
behind the stag when he was gazing at the hounds, or by 
watching an opportunity to gallop in roundly upon him and 
killing with the sword. (See many directions to this purpose 
in ‘ The Booke of Hunting.’) Wilson, the historian, has 
recorded a providential escape which befell him, when a 
young man, and a follower of the Earl of Essex : — ‘ Sir P. 
Lee, of Lime, in Cheshire, invited my lord one summer to 
hunt the stagg ; and having a great stagg in chase, and 
many gentlemen in pursuit, the stagg took soyle, and divers, 
among whom I was one, alighted, and stood ready with 
drawne swordes, to have a cut at him on his coming out of 
the water. The stagg then being wonderfully fierce and 
dangerous, made us youthes more eager to be at him. But 
he escaped us all, and it was my misfortune to be hindered 
of my coming nere him — the way being slipirie — by a fall, 
which gave occasion to some who did not know me, to 
speak as if I had fallen thro’ feare — which being told mee, 
I left the stagg, and followed the gentleman who (firste) 
spake it, but I found him of that cold temper that it seems 
his words made an escape from him, as by his denial and 
repentance it appeared. 
“ ‘ But this made mee much more violente in pursuite of 
the stagg - , to recover my reputation, and I happened to be 
the only horseman in when the dogs sett him up at bay, 
and approaching nere him on horseback he broke thro’ the 
dogs and ran at mee, and tore my horse’s side with his 
homes close by my thigh. Then I quitted my horse and 
grew more cunning (for the dogs had got him at bay again), 
stealing behind him, and with my sworde cutting his ham- 
strings, and then got upon his backe and cut his throat, 
which as I was doing, the companie came in and blamed 
my raslmesse for running such a hazard.’ ” 
The reader will remember that a similar feat is 
said to have been performed in the presence of 
.Queen Elizabeth. 
The Scottish kings appear to have been some- 
times content with a tamer kind of sport ; shooting 
with the bow from an elevated spot, before which 
the deer were driven, as is now often practised on 
the Continent. 
Pennant, in the second vol. of his “ History of 
Scotland,” when mentioning a walk that retained 
the name of “the King’s Seat,” having been the 
place where the Scottish monarchs placed them- 
selves to direct then - shafts at the flying deer driven 
that way, quotes the following English version of 
a story told by Barclay in an old treatise, Contra 
Monarchomachos, of Mary Queen of Scots, showing 
that even this style of sport had its danger. 
“ In the year 1563, the Earl of Atholl, a prince of the 
blood royal, bad with muck trouble and vast expense a 
hunting match for the entertainment of our most illustrious 
and most gracious Queen. Our people call this a royal 
