Almost All The Birds, The Only Really Free Things In This
Country Now, Move, Even Those That Do Not Quit The Island; And Why Not
The Deer In The Old Time When All The Woods Were Open To Them?
England is
not a large country, but there are considerable differences in the
climate and the time at which vegetation appears, quite sufficient of
themselves to induce animals to move from place to place.
We have no
narrowing buffalo zone to lament, for our buffalo zone disappeared long
ago. These parks and woods are islets of the olden time, dotted here and
there in the midst of the most modern agricultural scenery. These deer
and their ancestors have been confined within the pale for hundreds of
years, and though in a sense free, they are in no sense wild. But the old
power remains still. See the buck as he starts away, and jumps at every
leap as high as the fern. He would give the hounds a long chase yet.
The fern is fully four feet tall, hiding a boy entirely, and only showing
a man's head. The deer do not go through it unless startled; they prefer
to follow a track already made, one of their own trails. It is their
natural cover, and when the buckhounds meet near London the buck often
takes refuge in one or other of the fern-grown commons of which there are
many on the southern side. But fern is inimical to grass, and, while it
gives them cover, occupies the place of much more pleasant herbage.
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