These forests will by-and-by probably yield altogether about two hundred stags a year, besides a like number of hinds in the winter, but not until the newer forests have had a year or two more to allow of an increase of their stock of deer. It is impossible to estimate accurately the number of wild red-deer in Gairloch. Considering, however, the number of deer that may probably be killed in Gairloch after the next year or two, I would suppose that the stock when that time arrives will number about two thousand five hundred deer. This is a mere guess, based upon a comparison of the number killed and the stock on the ground, ascertained approximately by census, in some old deer forests that have come within my knowledge.
Stags are usually in condition for killing between 15th August and 8th or 10th October. These dates depend upon the season. In the case of a stag with a very fine head, the sportsman will probably not wish to shoot it until the horns are quite free from velvet, which perhaps may not be until well into September. Roaring begins in the last days of September, and a week or ten days later the stags are out of condition. There is no close time fixed by law for killing stags, and some proprietors do not even limit the season, which really fixes itself by the condition of the deer.
A stag which has twelve points to its antlers is called a royal, but a royal head is not necessarily first-rate. The best heads are distinguished by their wide span, thickness, and long points. A good stag is generally eight or ten years old at the least. The stag casts its horns every spring, and it is said the hinds eat the old horns; certainly they are seldom found.
Hinds are in the best condition for shooting in November and December. The hinds have only one calf in a year, though there have been rare cases known of a hind having two calves.
Deer-stalking is an arduous and absorbing sport,—its difficulty is its glory. This is especially so in the stag season, for in summer and autumn the deer often keep to the higher parts of the mountains. Frequently a stalk is only attempted when a good stag has been spied in the early morning, or even the day before. If it be decided to stalk a particular stag, the sportsman and his attendants endeavour to approach by such a route as that, if possible, they may not be visible, and so that no breeze may convey their scent to the wary deer. Notwithstanding every precaution, it will sometimes happen that the suspicious stag gets an alarm from a previously unseen sheep that has strayed into the forest, or from a crowing grouse, or a frightened mountain hare, or even an eagle, and it may be the chance of a shot is lost to the sportsman for that day.
Hence it will be seen how fatal to a successful stalk would be the sudden presence upon the scene of a thoughtless rambler upon the mountains, who, quite unintentionally it might be, would thus mar the pleasure and success of the hard-earned and well-paid-for sport of the deer-stalker.
Until late years the deer were hunted by staghounds, and the present method of deer-stalking was rarely practised. Now-a-days dogs are not much used except for the purpose of tracking wounded deer; and cross-bred dogs, including strains of the collie, pointer, lurcher, and other breeds, are found to be better adapted to this use than the handsome staghounds so grandly depicted by Sir Edwin Landseer, scent being more important than speed. Even for tracking, dogs are little used in the smaller forests, lest their baying might drive deer away to other ground.
In "The Pennylesse Pilgrimage," by John Taylor, "the King's Majestie's Water Poet," printed 1633, an excursion he made to Scotland is described. He visited the Earl of Mar at Braemar, and made the following quaint record:—
"There did I find the truely noble and Right Honourable Lords John Erskine, Earle of Marr; James Stuart, Earle of Murray; George Gordon, Earle of Engye, sonne and heire to the Marquise of Huntley; James Erskin, Earle of Bughan; and John, Lord Erskin, sonne and heire to the Earle of Marr, with their Countesses, with my much honoured, and my best assured and approved friend, Sir William Murray, Knight, of Abercarny, and hundreds of others, knights, esquires, and their followers; all and every man in general in one habit, as if Licurgus had been there and made lawes of equality. For once in the yeere, which is the whole moneth of August, and sometimes part of September, many of the nobility and gentry of the kingdome (for their pleasure) doe come into these Highland countries to hunt, where they doe conforme themselves to the habite of the Highland men, who, for the moste parte, speake nothing but Irish; and in former time were those people which were called red-shanks. Their habite is shoes with but one sole apiece; stockings (which they call short-hose) made of a warme stuff of divers colours, which they call tartane. As for breeches, many of them, nor their forefathers, never wore any, but a jerkin of the same stuffe that their hose is of, their garters being bands or wreathes of hay or straw, with a plaed about their shoulders, which is a mantle of divers colours, much finer and lighter stuffe than their hose, with blue flat caps on their heads, a handkerchiefe knit with two knots about their necks; and thus are they attyred. Now, their weapons are long bowes and forked arrowes, swords and targets, harquebusses, muskets, durks, and Loquhabor axes. With these weapons I found many of them armed for the hunting. As for their attire, any man of what degree soever that comes amongst them must not disdaine to weare it; for if they doe, then they will disdaine to hunt, or willingly bring in their dogges; but if men be kind unto them, and be in their habite, then they are conquered with kindnesse, and sport will be plentifull. This was the reason that I found so many noblemen and gentlemen in those shapes. But to proceed to the hunting.
"My good Lord of Marr having put me into that shape, I rode with him from his house, where I saw the ruines of an old castle called the castle of Kindroght," &c.