Forest and Stream 
$3 a Year, 10 Cts. a Copy, 
Six Months, $1.50. 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, APRIL 13, 1912. 
VOL. LXXVIIL—No. 15. 
187 Franklin St., New York 
Philippine Deer Hunt 
By ARTHUR L. GRIFFITHS 
R efer to a map of the Philippines, find 
Vigan on the western coast of northern 
Luzon, trace the Abra River, which flows 
into the treacherous China Sea' near Vigan, 
back to its sources and you will find the scene 
of this story. Deer are plentiful all over the 
Philippine Archipel¬ 
ago, having increased 
at will for centurie^t 
and seldom being- 
hunted except with 
spears. Philippine 
deer are but half the 
size of the American 
variety and are 
prong-horned instead 
of antlered. They 
are even more beau¬ 
tiful than our deer, 
being sleeker, fatter 
and more graceful. 
Of all the fauna of 
the Asiatic Archipel¬ 
ago they are the 
most charming. 
Meat is at a high 
premium in the prov¬ 
inces of the Philip¬ 
pines, and its only 
source of supply is 
from swine and deer, 
the swine either semi¬ 
wild in the villages 
or fully wild in the 
forests. Deer hunt¬ 
ing, though most ar¬ 
duous in its require- tfv, author (in rear 
ments, is almost a 
necessity, for the 
porcine dwellers of the pueblos are anything 
but discriminating in their diet and all kinds 
of offal is free of access. No deer hunter 
in those antipodal islands ever has the crisp 
days of our autumn in which to pursue his 
quarry, nor has he our open air-fanned woods, 
but must pursue his quest in a temperature 
akin to Tophet and in forests, the impenetrabil¬ 
ity of which only yields’pathway to the briskly- 
wielded bolo. 
Under such difficulties the habitat of the 
game is reached, but the difficulties of hunting 
deer in the Philippines are not only those of 
reaching its habitat. In America deer can be 
stalked or tracked, there never. In this coun¬ 
try a lone hunter may be successful, not so in 
those islands of the sea. There are no open 
woods, penetrable in silence, no snow on which 
to track, and the deer must be driven from 
covert to ambushed hunters, not possible for a 
lone huntsman. 
There is one way in which it is possible for 
two to hunt deer, but not probable after a first 
center) and n.vtive hunters, some of whom were insurgent officers. 
attempt. That is to lie in wait at night near a 
drinking spot. This is possible when the tropic 
moon sheds its wonderful lustre over the scene, 
but mosquitoes and hurtling cockroaches render 
such a hunt most unendurable. 
Some one has said that the mosquitoes have 
been substituted for carrier pigeons as a means 
of communication between the various islands 
of the archipelago, as the former are much 
larger and better able to endure the fatigues of 
the journeys. I hardly doubt the feasibility 
of such a plan after my numerous experiences 
with the tenacity of life and purpose of those 
multipeds. 
One unfortunate tropic night I attempted a 
still-hunt for deer. Pedro Gonzales and I lay 
down on a broken stone trail beside a croco¬ 
dile-infested lake near the drinking place of our 
desired quarry. The mosquitoes and broken 
stone both connived successfully to keep me 
wide awake, and Pedro, more immune, re¬ 
mained so far a time, but at length fell alseep. 
Soon I was apprised of the fact by stentorian 
snores, but he was 
too far away from 
me for me to arouse 
him without the pos¬ 
sibility of frighten¬ 
ing any possible deer, 
so I trusted in for¬ 
tune that his snores 
would not scare awaj 
the game. 
Suddenly, in th<' 
oppressive silence of 
the dank forest, there 
came a tremendous 
splash in the lake 
within twenty feet of 
where we lay. Croc¬ 
odiles ! The noise 
awoke Pedro and he 
hoarsely whispered 
“Cayman!” Our at¬ 
tention was at once 
diverted from watch¬ 
ing for deer to 
watching our own 
feet. Another louder 
and nearer splash 
came, and we hastily 
arose and beat a re¬ 
treat to Bucay, 
stumbling into and 
over obstacles only 
found in the tropics. 
Never again did we lie in wait for deer on the 
shores of that lake. 
Another night, which was to be blessed with 
the full moon’s glory, we two proceeded to a 
rice paddy near Laiyugan to repeat the search 
for deer. Like deer in our Northern climes, 
Philippine deer wander in the gloaming of early 
evening. At the rice paddy by Laiyugan the 
omnipresent mosquitoes were thicker than at 
the crocodile-infested lake. After a two-hours’ 
wait, accentuated by silent battle with the blood¬ 
thirsty pests, we heard an animal moving in 
the cogon grass beside the paddy. Our hearts 
leaped. So did the animal, down into the paddy. 
Where was he? We could distinctly hear him. 
but could not see a thing. For half an hour 
we heard that deer wandering about among the 
