210 STAG; 
the rutting season, of a disagreeable taste and 
smell, affords, at other times, wholesome and plea- 
sant food. The tallow is made into very good 
candles. Spirit of hartshorn is a well known 
stimulant. 
When a herd of stags have to pass a pretty wide 
river, which they are able to do without much diffi- 
culty, they are said to rest their heads on each other's 
rumps. When the leader is fatigued, he retreats 
to the rear, and suffers the next in succession to take 
his place. 
The natives of Louisiana hunt these animals 
both for food, and as an amusement. This is some- 
times done in companies, and sometimes alone. 
The hunter, who goes out alone, furnishes himself 
with the dried head of a stag, having part of the 
skin of the neck attached to it. This, a gun, and 
a branch of a tree, or piece of a bush, are all that 
he has need of. When he comes near any of the wild 
deer, hiding himself behind the bush, which he 
carries in his hand, he approaches very gently till 
he is within shot. If the animal appears alarmed, 
the hunter immediately counterfeits the deers’ call 
to each other, and holds the head just above the 
bush ; then lowering it towards the * ground, and 
lifting it by turns, he so deceives the stag with the 
appearance of a companion, that he seldom fails t®' 
corne towards it, in which case the hunter fires 
into the hollow of his shoulder, and lays him dead 
©n the spot. 
When the hunters go in large parties* they form a 
wide crescent round one of these animals, the points 
of which may be half a mile asunder. Some of 
them approach towards the stag, which runs, af- 
frighted, to the other side, when finding them on 
that part advancing, lie immediately rushes back 
again. Thus he is driven from side to side, the 
crescent closing into a circle, and gradually ap~ 
