Roe Deer 
197 
for me was a most curious little beast. He evinced no animosity for the children, but could 
not stand the keeper’s wife at any price, always attacking her if she turned her back on 
him. Things at last reached a climax one day, and though the scene was a comic one, 
the lady was very much hurt, and particularly her—ahem—feelings. She was stooping 
down washing clothes in the burn, when the buck caught her fairly in her ample seat and 
sent her flying head over heels into the stream. Little things like this made him unpopular, 
but I was loth to kill him, as he had such a keen sense of the ridiculous, so had him driven 
into the woods, where he was, I believe, slain at one of the annual shoots. With the 
exception of the Japanese deer, the roebuck, when tamed, is about as unsafe as any deer, 
for you never know when he will turn on you, and for an animal of his size his strength 
is remarkable, and should not be underrated. I became convinced of this one day at 
Rohallion when, posted forward, I had knocked over a two-year-old buck. He was only 
stunned, so I put down my gun and got out my knife to stick him. At that moment he 
commenced to struggle violently, and, knocking the knife out of my hand, we rolled 
several yards down the hill together. I still kept hold of a hind and a fore leg, not 
meaning to let him go, and there we had to wrestle for about two minutes till the beaters 
came up and relieved me, much to their amusement. I could not have held on a moment 
longer, but the roe was as lively as ever. His long and strong hind legs give a roe 
considerable pushing power, and he endeavours to pin you down with his head and then 
pummel you. 
Roe are subject to epidemics, but more rarely than other species. About ten years 
ago a murrain of some description made its appearance at Beaufort, and John Ross, in that 
one season, picked up the dead bodies of over seventy. Diseases of all sorts are, however, 
decidedly rare amongst them, and they stand a severe winter better than stags do, eating bark 
and shoots freely, like rabbits. 
It is curious that they will not always thrive when introduced into parks to all 
appearance suitable for them. At Leonardslee, about the driest and most protected spot in 
England where wild animals are kept, and where antelopes even thrive exceedingly, roe are 
not a success, and Mr. G. Assheton-Smith considers them very delicate. Two which got 
out of his park at Vaynol were chased only a few hundred yards by a dog and then jumped 
back into the park. Both were found dead next morning. I cannot understand this, and 
think that most probably the animals were in poor condition, as they had recently been 
turned down, particularly so because roe are regularly hunted with hounds down in the 
Blackmoor Vale country in Dorsetshire. 
In March 1896 I went down to Dorsetshire, at the kind invitation of the Earl of 
Ilchester, on purpose to see this form of hunting and the way in which roe behave before 
hounds. My host was most kind and got out his special hounds, but luck was against us, 
and we did not find until it was almost pitch dark, so that I saw nothing, and have not even 
the cheek to give a picture by “our special artist” on the spot. The ground that the roe 
live in here consists of a series of coombes, covered with thick undergrowth and low- 
growing bushes, situated for the most part on the sides of the high downs, so a good view 
can be obtained all round when the game breaks and gallops for another cover, sometimes 
a mile or two away. Lord Ilchester, who is very fond of this sport, says the roe go at a 
