MY HEAVIEST STAG.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VIII, Issue 652, 18 March 1914, Page 2

MY HEAVIEST STAG.

HOW HE WAS STALKED

Mere was our stag; by one o'clock wo made the first attempt on him. The stalk looked as if it would be a simple one ; but when I was probably within a few minutes of getting the shot a young stag jumped out of a hole and bolted full in his sight, and he and'his hinds made a long passage to the south and disappeared, and we were as far off success as ever. It was some time before we were able to pick up the stag again, now as far below us as he had been before above. He was by himself in a little hollow ; he stood there like a carved statue watching; for twenty niimites not a limb moved —only now and then a horn. Here again the little hill parliament engaged in eager debate; should we try him where he was, or would it be better to '"move" him and trust to being able to manoeuvre safely up above ? Moving deer, unless there is a wellknown pass, is risky work, and yet to get at him where he was would be a difficult business; there was another stag lying down within a few hundred yards of him, and the stalk at the one might be impossible without disturbing the other. Much we debated: but the day was getting on, and finally we made a quick descent over the rough hillside—a long detour to be sure of the wind —and then the lady and the gillies got into a sheltered corner, and Alistair Macdonald, the second stalker, and I went on. We got near the hollow, but success was as far from us as ever. Knoll after knoll from which to shoot was gained in vain; I could make out nothing of the stag. With utmost caution we crawled to several other possible positions, not so much afraid of him as of the drowsy cud-chew-ing outlier we had seen from above; and at last we crawled into the latter's view arid he was up and off, and our beast w'ith him—off in good earnest this time, it . seemed, and for far.-

It was nearly five o'clock —the hour when perhaps most shots in a forest are made —when a dejected and unhappy little company united and followed on towards the west. The details of the third attempt would take too long to relate. With great luck we picked up the second stag, managed with some difficulty to avoid him and get past him quickly climbed a steep ridge, and then suddenly I found myself lying with the cocked rifle in a fairly comfortable position within a hundred and twenty yards of the great stag. He was very uneasy—looking back often, slowly walking on. 1 shall always be grateful to Fortune, who has played me many a queer trick, that she gave me then a helping hand. This stag weighed 24st. 121b., and had a very fine thirteenpoint head with a strong rough horn: few better, I think, went to Macleay's at Inverness that year. Till a few hours before his death ho one knew that there was such" a deer on the ground. It is certain, I think, that he had spent the whole of his days in the woods of copses on the hillside, only coming out at night to feed; otherwise it would have been impossible to have overlooked him—Wilfred Hartley, in the "Cornhill Magazine."