hen the devoted deer was separated from his
companions, they gave him, by their watches, law, as they called it, for
twenty minutes; when, sounding their horns, the stop-dogs were permitted
to pursue, and a most gallant scene ensued.

LETTER VII.

Though large herds of deer do much harm to the neighbourhood, yet the
injury to the morals of the people is of more moment than the loss of
their crops. The temptation is irresistible; for most men are sportsmen
by constitution: and there is such an inherent spirit for hunting in
human nature, as scarce any inhibitions can restrain. Hence, towards the
beginning of this century all this country was wild about deer-stealing.
Unless he was a hunter, as they affected to call themselves, no young
person was allowed to be possessed of manhood or gallantry. The Waltham
blacks at length committed such enormities, that Government was forced to
interfere with that severe and sanguinary act called the "Black Act,"
which now comprehends more felonies than any law that ever was framed
before. And, therefore, a late Bishop of Winchester, when urged to
re-stock Waltham Chase, refused, from a motive worthy of a prelate,
replying "that it had done mischief enough already."

Our old race of deer-stealers is hardly extinct yet: it was but a little
while ago that, over their ale, they used to recount the exploits of
their youth; such as watching the pregnant hind to her lair, and, when
the calf was dropped, paring its feet with a penknife to the quick to
prevent its escape, till it was large and fat enough to be killed; the
shooting at one of their neighbours with a bullet in a turnip-field by
moonshine, mistaking him for a deer; and the losing a dog in the
following extraordinary manner: Some fellows, suspecting that a calf
new-fallen was deposited in a certain spot of thick fern, went, with a
lurcher, to surprise it; when the parent-hind rushed out of the brake,
and, taking a vast spring with all her feet close together, pitched upon
the neck of the dog, and broke it short in two.

Another temptation to idleness and sporting was a number of rabbits,
which possessed all the hillocks and dry places: but these being
inconvenient to the huntsmen, on account of their burrows, when they came
to take away the deer, they permitted the country people to destroy them
all.

Such forests and wastes, when their allurements to irregularities are
removed, are of considerable service to neighbou