220 
PASSIONAL ZOOLOGY. 
■when not an aspen leaf stirs, and when warm vapors rise in gushes 
from the seething ground, I was at the foot of one of the oldest 
oaks of Armainvilliers, where I had found a buzzard’s nest. 
I had sent a boy up the tree, and was encouraging him in his 
dangerous ascent by my voice and gestures, when at the first foik 
of the branches, he suddenly stopped, and by an eloquent panto- 
mime called me to share his post, when he made me understand 
that I should behold a sight of great interest for me. 
This scene, to judge by the quick glancing of his eyes from me 
to it and back again, was passing very near us. In two minutes I 
was with my comrade, at the height of this improvised observatory, 
and no sooner was I nestled beside him, so as not to dread a fall, 
when his finger, pointing to a causeway in the swamp, designated 
the object which had fascinated his attention. 
A full grown stag issued from the forest, had paused in the 
midst of an alley of apple trees, edging the swamp, and from his 
attitude, that of a tired animal which rests and listens, it was evi- 
dent that hunted for a long time, he w^as bending all the re- 
sources of a wonderful instinct upon the best means of concealing 
his course. Whether by means of an exchange, or by setting the 
hounds at fault, he had gained a great distance in advance of his 
pursuers, for there was not a breath of wind, and in this calm si- 
lence where only the sound of the locust rubbing together its 
gauze wings could be heard, not a single bark nor the distant 
note of a bugle disturbed the solitude. 
From the edge of the clearing where our secular oak stood, we 
were not more than one hundred and fifty paces from the stag, and 
as at this place the border of the forest was planted in young 
hedges of from four to five years old, at the height wher^e we 
were, which overlooked all around us, Ave could lose no movement 
of the fugitive, apparently very anxious about his route. First, 
he took a meadow to the left as if to come out openly and gain a 
neighboring forest, but suddenly, whether from want of confi- 
dence in his strength or preferring to trust his safety to cunning, 
he briskly returned on his track, and whoever pretends to the 
name of huifter shall judge whether it was a scene of palpitating 
emotion that was prepared under my eyes, where, thanks to 
