British Deer and their Horns 
complete, and we know under ordinary circumstances the supply of blood to it then ceases 
as well as to the skin covering. Such should have taken place by ist September, but in this 
instance the blood-vessels were in full activity on 13th October, and the hair on the skin 
covering was already twice as long as that usually found on a stag in velvet , and to all appearance 
still growing. 1 
A stag with a very curious facial malformation was shot by Major Claude Cane at 
Ardlair on 26th August 1896. I give a sketch of it which I made in Macleay’s shop. It 
is obviously a case of malformation from birth, but the stag was in good condition and had 
managed to feed in spite of his drawbacks. Another curiosity was in the hands of Mr. 
Snowie this autumn (1896). We hear of lots o i sportsmen objecting to the wire fencing, but 
here was a case in which a stag, shot by Mr. Ralph Sneyd at Glenquoich, had endeavoured 
to demolish the prison bars, for neatly entwined round the brows and bays were about three 
yards of deer-fence wire. The wonder was how the stag failed to become entangled and 
held fast, and how he managed to break the wire off so neatly and escape. 
To conclude this chapter is the photograph of a pretty site chosen by swallows for 
their nest. For several years the birds have reared their young on the left crown of these 
antlers, and in 1886, when the photograph was taken, the young are seen about to fly. 
The chances are that if this stag had lived, the overflow supply would eventually have hardened into a mossed growth over 
the true horn, and after rubbing clean there would have been a stag’s head similar to that of the two mossed roe heads at the end 
of Chapter X. 
SWALLOWS 5 NEST AND YOUNG ON stag’s HORNS AT WARNHAM COURT, SUSSEX, 1886 
