as if he had but just been roused.
Thus at last he reached the familiar wood. A Jay flew screaming before
him as he entered it, but he heeded her not. His head was beginning to
swim, but he still knew the densest quarter of the covert and made his
way to it. The brambles clutched at him and the branches tripped him
at every step, yet he never paused, but shook them off and went
crashing and blundering on, till at length with one gigantic leap he
hurled himself into the thickest of the underwood and lay fast.

After a time he heard the note of a hound entering the wood, and he
knew the voice, but he lay still. Then other hounds came up speaking
also, and he heard them working slowly towards his hiding-place. But
as they drew near the thicket the voices were less numerous, and only
a few hounds seemed to have strength and courage to face it. He caught
the voice of the black and tan hound speaking fitfully as he came
nearer and nearer, and more impatiently as he struggled with the
brambles and binders that barred his way. At last it reached the place
from which he had leaped into his refuge, and there it fell silent.
Still the hound cast on, and from a path far above came the voice of
a man encouraging him, and encouraging other hounds to help him. But
the Deer lay like a stone, while the hounds tried all round within
only a few yards of him, when all of a sudden the old hound caught the
wind of him and made a bound at him where he lay. The Deer jumped to
his feet and faced him, and the old hound bayed again with triumph,
but dared not come within reach. So there they stood for two whole
minutes till the other hounds came up all round him. Then one hound in
his insolence came too near, and in an instant the Deer reared up, and
plunging his antlers deep into his side, fairly pinned him to the
ground, so that the hound never moved again. Then he broke through the
rest of them, spurning them wide with horn and hoof, and crashed on
through the covert towards the valley.

And as he came to the edge of the wood he heard the song of the
peat-stream rise before him, and knew that he had still one refuge
left. Reeling and desperate he scrambled out of the wood and leaped
down into the park at its foot. The Fallow-Deer were not to be seen,
for they had heard the cry of the hounds in the wood and had hidden
themselves in alarm among the trees, but the Stag heard the voice of
the stream calling to him louder than he had ever heard it