4 2 British Deer and their Horns
12,000 men, and hounded and hawked all the country and bounds, and killed eighteen score harts. Next
summer he went to hunt in Athol, accompanied by Queen Margaret and the Pope’s Ambassador, where
he remained three days most nobly entertained by the Earl, and killed thirty score o f hart and hynd, with
other small beasts, as roe and roebuck, wolf and fox, and wild cats.
A little later on, Queen Mary o f Scotland hunted with equal pomp and circumstance.
O f her most famous hunt minute particulars are given by Barclay, who says that on this
notable occasion scouts were sent out to gather the deer in, not only in Atholc but m Mar,
Badenoch, and Moray, and that the result was 3:6s deer, 5 wolves, and some
To-day it is estimated that there are over 2,000,000 acres devoted to Ihe maintenance
o f deer in Scotland, and that about 5000 stags are annually killed. T h e deer forests number
h i , exclusive o f those that have been formed since 1883 ; and according to Mr. Grimble
they are distributed as follows : Aberdeenshire, 5 ; Argyleshire, 8 ; Banffshire, 2 ; Buteshire,
1 ; Caithness-shire, 1 ; Forfarshire, 3 ; Inverness-shire, 39 ; Perthshire, 8 ; Ross-shire, 38 ;
and Sutherlandshire, 6. O f these, Mr. Malcolm tells us, 20 were formed prior to 1800, 59
from 1800 to 1872, and 30 from 1872 to 1883. And now 21 more forests must be added to
the account, for since 1883 estates to that number have been cleared o f sheep and are now let
as forests to sportsmen, who are glad to take what they can get in that way so near at home.
And now for a little wander away into the bypaths o f natural history, for, as I have
said before, my special desire is to avoid here (as I have endeavoured to do in previous publications)
the beaten track o f previous writers. T h e ordinary habits o f wild deer have been
already portrayed usque ad nauseam by men who know all about them and men who do not ;
and nowhere are they more admirably set forth than in Mr. Grimble’s Deer-Stalking and
Mr. Collyns’s Chase o f the Wild Red Deer, the former dealing with deer in Scotland, and the
latter with deer in England. There is no need, therefore, to burden the world with another
treatise on the subject.
How does a stag swim ? That is one o f the many points on which old and experienced
stalkers disagree. During two seasons, when doing a good deal o f stalking, I made it my
business to ask this question o f each o f my companions on the hill, and their answers were
about equally opposed, one half asserting that only the head and upper part o f the neck are
held clear o f the water, while the other ha lf insisted that the whole line o f the back and
shoulders appears above the surface ; only one man, and he by far the most experienced and
observant stalker, said candidly he did not know, though he had seen them swimming
scores o f times. For my part, I feel sure that in deep water, especially when in for a longdistance
swim, a stag shows nothing but his head, his mouth being just clear o f the water,
and that only on coming into the shallows preparatory to landing can any part o f his body
be seen. But the point is, I think, worth clearing up.1
1 In the A rt o f t'ttterie is the following quaint note on this subject: “ When the harts passe the greate ryvcrs, or some arme
of the sea, to go to rut in some ile or forest, they assemble themselves in great hcardes, and knowing which of them is strongest
and best swimmer, they make him go foremost, and then he which cometh next him stayeth up his lieadc upon the back of the