Red Deer Fur and Feather Series
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F^ur and Leather Series edited hy ALFRED E. T. WATSON RED DEER FUR AND FEATHER SERIES. Edited by ALFRED E. T. WATSON. THE PARTRIDGE. NATURAL HISTORY— — j Rev. H. A. Macpherson. SHOOTING By A. J. Stuart- i WoRTLEY. COO/Y^'/i’K— Saintsbury. With By George ! I II Illustrations by A. Thorburn, A. J. Stuart-Wortley, j various $s. , ! and C. Whymper, and Diagrams. Crown 8vo. I j THE GROUSE. NATURAL HIS TOR y-By the Rev. 1 j H. A. Macpherson. SHOOTING — By A. Stuart- J. ; WoRTi.Ev. COO KERY— By George Saintsbury. With 13 Illustrations by A. J. Stuart-Wortley and A Thorburn, and various Diagrams. Crown 8vo. 5J. j THE PHEASANT. NATURAL HISTORY—By the j j Rev. H. A. Macpherson. A. Stuart- SHOOTING—By J. | WoRTLFY. COOKERY—By Alexander Innes Shand. j I With 10 Illustrations by A. Thorburn and A. J. Stuart- WoRTLEY, various j and Diagrams. Crown 8vo. 5J. I the ; THE HARE. NATURAL HISTORY—By Rev. j H. A. Macpherson. .S’/'/DDTYWG— the Hon. Gerald i By Lascelles. COURSING— By Charles Richardson. j — | I I H UNTl NG By J. S. Gibbons and G. H. Longman. -COOKERY— By Col. Kenney Herbert. With 8 Illus- j trations by G. D. Giles, A. Thorburn, and C. Whymper. Crown 8vo. 5^. [ THE RED DEER. NATURAL HISTORY.—By the Rev. H. A. Macpherson. DEER -STALKING — By Cameron ok Lochiel. .S’/’/JC-Z/t/WT'/WG— By Viscount Ebrington. COD A'.ffA’ I'— By .Alexander Innes Shand. With 9 Illustrations by J. Ch.arlton and A. Thorburn. Crown 8vo. 5^. WILDFOWL. By the Hon. John Scott-Montagu, M.P. &c. [/« preparation . LONGMANS, GREEN, & CO. London, New York, and Bombay. TUE L43T STAG OF THE SEASON RED DEER NATURAL HISTORY BY THE REV. H. A. MACPHERSON DEER - S TALKING BY CAMERON OF LOCHIEL STAG-HUNTING BY VISCOUNT EBRINGTON COOKERY BY ALEXANDER INNES SHAND ILLUSTRATIONS BY J. CHARLTON AND A, THORBURN LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. LONDON, NEW YORK, AND BOMBAY 1896 All rights reserved PREFACE The design of the Fur and Feather Series is to present monographs, as complete as they can possibly be made, on the various English birds and beasts which are generally included under the head of Game. Books on Natural History cover such a vast number of subjects that their writers necessarily find it impossible to deal with each in a really comprehensive manner : and it is not within the scope of such works exhaustively to discuss the animals described, in the light of objects of sport. Books on sport, again, seldom treat at length of the, Natural History of the furred and feathered creatures which arc shot or otherwise taken and, so far as the Editor is aware, in no ; book hitherto published on Natural History or Sport has information been given as to the best methods of turning the contents of the bag to account. VI PREFACE Each volume of the present Scries vvu'll, therefore, be devoted to a bird or beast, and will be divided into three parts. The Natural will first be given it Histoiy of the variety ; will then be considered from the point of view of sport and the writer of the third division ; will assum.c that the creature has been carried to the larder, and will proceed to discuss it gas- tronomically. The origin of the animals will be traced, their birth and breeding described, every known method of circumventing and killing them —not omitting the methods em- ployed by the poacher — will be explained w'ith special regard to modern developments, and they will only be left when on the table in the most appetising forms which the delicate science of cookerx" has discovered. It is intended to make the illustrations a prominent feature in the Series. The pictures in the present volume are after drawings by Mr. John Charlton and Mr. Archibald Thorburn. ALFRED E. T. WATSON. CONTENTS NATURAL HISTORY OF THE RED DEER I’v THE Rev H. A. Machherson CHAP. PAGE L Tkk Rkd Deer’s Home . ... 3 II. The Red Deer’s Life 26 HI. Echoes of the Chase 45 DEERSTA LKING l!v Cameron’ of Lochiee I. l.NTRODUCTTOX 65 H. The .Management of Forests . Deer . 77 HI. The Pr.actice of Deer-.Stai.king . 131 IV. Deer Forests; Their Social and Economical Asi-ects 169 STAG-HUNTING By the Viscount Kiiringto.v I. In Days of Yore 197 II. In France 208 HI. In Devon and .Somersei' 215 vm CONTENTS CHAP. l*AGF- IV. Tiiii Chase • 235 V. Hounds and Horses . • • 250 VI. Deer . 268 VII. Notes eor Visitors . , . 281 THE COOKERY OF VENISON Hy Alexandek Innes Shanu ILLUSTRATIONS BY f. Charlton and A. Thorburn {Reproduced hy the Swan Electric Engraving Company') VlGNETTB ..... Title-page Tup: Last Stag, ok the Season Frontispiece Moon-lighters . To face p. 20 Driven ofk the Hill ,,28 Getting on the Deer 148 . Lost . ,, 160 Rather a IIandkui 210 Swam oqt, the whole I’acr at his Heels ,, 243 Killed after Running through Twelve Different Parishes .... ,, 248 NATURAL HISTORY OF THE RED DEER BY THE REV. H. A. MACPHERSON, M.A, li I 1 V ] -i I V p CHAPTER I THE RED deer’s HOME The history of the wild red deer [Cervus elaphus) is life closely interwoven with our national ; nor can we doubt that in former days the exercise of hunting served to develop the best qualities of physical excel- lence in much the same way in which athletic sports at present influence the rising generation of Eng- lishmen. Many Acts of Parliament were passed in both England and Scotland, intended to restrict the pleasures of the chase, and to reserve them for the most powerful. But the red deer inhabited our islands long before the historic period. Its range then as now included most of temperate Europe ; but the stags which ‘ belled ’ over our moors and mosses in those distant days carried much finer antlers than their modern descendants. The sands of Morecambe Bay have a reputation at the present time for the large symmetrical horns which are from time to time washed 4 NATURAL HISTORY OF THE RED DEER out by the tide from the holes in which they have lain embedded for ages. The peat bogs of Scotland, especially of the Western Highlands, tell the same story. Even the gravel beds of our inland valleys often yield fragments of red deer antlers, sometimes at a great depth below' the present surface. These remains are seldom quite perfect. Those found in the rubbish heaps of Roman settlements usually bear evidence of having been sawn asunder by w'orkmen, whose task it w'as to manufacture spear-handles and other utensils from stag-horn. But the fine development of most of the remains show's that our modern stags fall far short of the standard of heads carried by the stags w'hich cropped our hill- sides when the aurochs fought w'ith rival bulls on the fells of Westmorland, and w'olves found a safe retreat among the liriiestone caves of Furness. Originally, the red deer roamed at will from the north to the south of Britain. The w'eald of Kent was no less the haunt of well-furnished hinds than the waste lands of Lancashire, or the more distant solitudes of central Scotland. But the interests of the great barons in- duced them to obtain authority from the Crow'n to enclose their favourite chase in many instances w'ith ; the result that a large number of the best coverts for deer became secluded as private property. This re- THE RED DEER'S HOME 5 mark applies to England almost entirely. I have no special information as to Ireland. The subject of Irish red deer has been dealt with by several writers of Irish nationality, including Archdeacon Rowan, whose ‘ Lake Lore ’ contains a chapter on the red deer of the Killarney Mountains. Mr. R. J. Ussher contributed to the ‘ Zoologist ’ a paper entitled ‘ Notes on Irish Red Deer,’ from which some useful informa- tion may be gleaned (‘Zook,’ 1882, pp. 81-84). Thompson’s ‘ Natural History of Ireland ’ should also be consulted. Our English red deer have received ample justice at the hands of Dr. Collyns and Richard Jefferies, but only as regards that stronghold of the race which exists among the Devonian woodlands. St. John and other Scottish sportsmen have done ample justice to our grand Highland deer ; but, curiously enough, no one except the writer himself has attempted to depict the life of the stag upon the face of the mist-wrapped hills of the English Lake district. This fact may well serve as an excuse for including in the present volume a description of the pictur- esque region in the midst of which the red deer, which once roamed from the shores of the North Sea to the red sandstone cliffs that break the swell of the Irish Channel, have for many years past found their only northern sanctuary. The forest ofMartindale is 6 NATURAL HISTORY OF THE RED DEER situated in the very heart of the Lake district. It is bounded on the north by the long winding reaches of Ulleswater Lake. Haweswater, a lonely loch, abound- ing in charr and gwyniad, bars a way of escape to the eastward, unless an outlying deer makes for Shap Fell. High Street, across which the Roman sappers engineered a military road, is a favourite haunt of the but over to Windermere red deer ; they do not roam or Potterdale under ordinary circumstances. Indeed, the deer are most partial to the centre of Martindale, which includes the valleys of Boarsdale, Bannerdale, Rampsgill, and Fusedale.