the very deuce, and soon had the country-side in a state o f terror. T h e y to drive
about in a lifeboat on wheels, and drawn by six. cart horses, but vaned existence by
occasionally swooping down on a farmhouse, scaring the inmates and malting free with
whatever they could lay their hands on. These little escapades were o f coprse, always
squared afterwards, and none enjoyed the fun more than Sir William, who was very popular
with his people. I f my reader is a lover o f Punch, which he is pretty sure to be he
will recollect a drawing by John Leech o f M r. Briggs being taken through th e Buffalo Park
by his friend. That friend was my lather, and Mr. Briggs was o frp u js e Leech himself.
I have often heard the story about that day amongst the b u ff ilB ^ g l I
By and by the buffaloes died off or were killed, and the last old bull broke o u * the
park somehow, and meeting the mail coach going north, proceeded to knock the stuffin
out o f the horses. But there was an unfeeling man on the coach who had a rifle and no
sense o f humour, so the last o f the Scotch buffaloes had to go. , ~
But to return to our fallow bucks which had delivered themselves into the hands of
the destroyers— at least so we thought. To make a long story short, we never even got
a shot at them the first day, though the park was not o f great size. The next day I got a
chance at one o f the bucks at about forty yards and broke his foreleg, and we now made
sure of him, but just as both the bucks were coming on nicely to Keay, the unwounded one
smelt a rat, made a jump, and scrambled right up the high stone wall and squeezed himself
under the wires at the top, being immediately followed by the second buck, whom we
considered quite incapable o f performing such a feat. T h e above is an absolute fact, and
the keepers, Mr. Bett, and myself were alike astonished at the agility displayed by the
beasts. What an animal like the deer w ill jump when he is fairly put to it by fear or
impulse is a very different thing from their actions o f calmer moments. I have never had
an opportunity o f testing the length o f the fallow deer’s sight compared with that o f red
deer, but I am convinced' that where it is necessary for them to use their eyes for self-
protection the sight is quicker even than roe, and much quicker than red deer. Their
powers o f scent are perhaps about equal to red deer and superior to roe. Fallow deer in
big woods nearly always lie very close, and then break back through the beaters. In
proportion to its size a fallow buck is very tenacious o f life, much more so than red deer,
and requires to be struck in the right place.
I have noticed as a rule it is the male only o f these wild fallow deer that travels far
from the main Dunkeld and Cardney woods ; a few generally cross the Tay and move west
and south at the end o f July, returning again by the mating season at the beginning of
November. Perhaps, like the wapiti o f Western America, they have learned the danger
which may be incurred at the expense o f the pleasure o f hearing their own voices at the
time o f love and war ; at any rate the wild fallow are remarkably silent, only giving vent to a
grunt now and again, and not keeping up his wooing all day like a mating buck in a park.
There are few deer and antelopes that are not worth studying, for nearly every member
o f the various groups betrays a strong individuality that is entirely his own. Both the
artist and the naturalist who wishes to conscientiously do his work and render justice to the
several individuals should, properly speaking, give up many months o f observation to each
separate creature, and it is only by so doing professionally that the observer can really get at
the true heart o f the character which governs all the habits and movements o f any particular
THE USUAL ORDER OF THE SEXES WHEN TRAVELLING
creature. I am not one o f those who, just because a beast happens to be very common and
under our noses every day o f our lives, think that we know all about him ; I think the best
o f us know very little about anything. It is perhaps for that very reason that most people
utterly neglect,one so common as the fallow buck. We turn up our so-called standard
works and find the most minute descriptions o f Sitatungas and Ovis poll, but poor old
Cervus dama, who, like the poor, is ever with us, is dismissed in a few lines. Personally I
think one will repay study just as well as the other. Anything in the way o f animal life,
well-nigh unattainable, though it may be o f but ordinary interest, is eagerly sought after by
the hunter. Yet to make a comparison, Ovis p o ll is not o f much greater interest from the
point o f view o f his general habits than the Highland ram with his beautiful curly horns.
I f the two could be made to change places one day, we should have plenty o f keen and
plucky hunters who would dash off at once to the ends o f the earth, and could then write up
his natural history and be happy in the possession o f his noble trophies. Now I hope the
reader will forgive this moralising, but I only wish to show that we do not know everything
yet even about the sparrow in the street, and very few educated people recognise him in the