FAWNS IN THE "FENCE-MONTHS."
" DEFENSE de chasser " is probably the origin of the ancient term of venery which heads the notices posted during May and June at the gates of the Royal deer- parks, requesting that during the " fence-months " visitors will prevent their dogs from disturbing the deer. It is reasonable that the respite formerly granted from the persecu- tion of the bunter should still be enforced to secure the deer from the yelping terriers of thoughtless Londoners, for it is in the months of May and June that the fawns of both the red and fallow deer are born. In June, when 'Richmond' Park threemain herds into which the seventeen hundred head of deer in the park usually divide, are broken up. The stags have shed their horns, and steal away in small parties into the quiet parts of the park until their new antlers are grown, and the does and hinds are severally occupied in the most anxious care of their fawns. It is not until some weeks after their birth that these beautiful little creatures are seen in any number by the chance visitor to the park. Though both the red and fallow fawns can follow their hinds within a few minutes of their birth, the careful mothers hide them in the tall fern or patches of rashes and nettles, and it is only the older fawns that are seen lying in the open ground or trotting with the herds. When the fawn is born, the mother gently pushes it with her nose until it lies down in the fern, and then goes away and watches from a distance, only re- turning at intervals to feed it, or, if the wind changes, or rain threatens, to draw it away to more sheltered ground. They are not only most affectionate, but also most courageous mothers. Not long ago, a carriage was being driven along the road which skirts the wooded hill upon which the White Lodge stands. There is a considerable space of flat, open ground between the wood and the road ; but a young red-deer hind which was watching her first calf was so excited by the barking of a collie-dog which accompanied the carriage, that she ran down from the hill and attacked and wounded the dog with her fore-feet, until she drove it for refuge under the carriage. As she continued to bar the road, the carriage was turned round and driven back, but was all the way followed by the hind until it left the park by the Robin Hood Gate. Gilbert White mentions a similar attack made on a dog in defence of her fawn by one of the half-wild hinds in Wolmer Forest. " Some fellows," he writes, " 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 break, and taking a vast spring, with all her feet close together, pitched upon the neck of the dog, and broke it !"
the oak-grove upon the sides, and the thick fern upon the flat top of the White Lodge hill, are the most likely spots in which to find the hidden fawns. The red-deer seem to prefer the patches of tall rushes which grow among the oaks ; and the fallow, the thicker shelter of the fern. There are also tall nettle-beds round the enclosure, in which the deer are fed in winter, and where in summer lumps of rock-salt are laid for them to lick. These uninviting nettle-beds are, strange to say, favourite layettes with the fallow hinds, and in them the writer has more than once found a sleeping fawn.
It would be difficult to see a prettier picture of young sylvan life than a red-deer fawn lying in one of the patches of rushes among the oaks. Unlike the full-grown red-deer, the fawns are beautifully spotted with white, and the colour of the coat is a bright tan, matching the dead oak-leaves which are piled among the rushes. If the spectator approaches from the lee- ward side, he may come within a few feet of the fawn, which lies curled up, with its head resting on its flank. Presently it raises its head, and looks at its visitor with grave, wide-open eyes, and if not disturbed, will go to sleep again. Otherwise it bounds up and is at once joined by the mother, who has been standing "afar off to wit what would be done to him." As the hind and fawn trot away side by side, the greater grace of the young animal is at once apparent. The head is smaller, the neck and back straighter, and the ears shorter in the fawn, and the eye is larger, and even more dark and gentle. The fawns of the fallow-deer are quite as distinct in appearance from those of the red-deer as are the full-grown animals of either kind, both in colour and shape. There are three varieties of fallow-deer, and though these are often 'members of the same herd, the fawns of each seem generally to retain the colour of the mother, the dark mouse-coloured hinds having dark fawns, the white hinds cream-coloured fawns, while the young of the common spotted variety are white, mottled with light-fawn colour, which gradually takes later the dappled hue of the parent-hind. Occasionally a very light fawn may be seen, which is probably a cross between the white and dappled varieties. But none of the fallow-deer fawns have the grace of the red-deer calf ; they are less deer- like, and in some respects, especially by their long, thick legs, they suggest a week-old lamb ; while the head is more rounded, and the muzzle less pointed than in the red-deer. They seem to leave the fern and join their mothers earlier than their
larger cousins, and are shyer and less easy of approach,—a wildness which seems difficult to account for in the young of a species which has been domesticated for so many centuries. In order to approach them nearly, it is as well to take the precaution of walking up from the leeward side. Even park deer seldom become wholly in- different to the scent of man ; a score of hinds and fawns may be lying scattered under the oaks on the hill-side during a hot June day, enjoying the breeze and shade, and plainly unwilling to move. Yet if a stranger pass to windward of them, they will all rise, and when he comes in sight, move off to a distance. So when, in the winter, the keeper whom they know brings the hay to their feeding enclosure, they will scent him from a distance, and gather round the feeding-pen almost like cattle, some even venturing to pick up the hay as he throws it from the fork. But if a stranger be with him, not a deer will enter the enclosure, and few will appear in sight. Like wild deer, they seem to have greater mistrust of the danger which they can scent than of any object which they can see.
At the end of summer, when the fawns are weaned and the stags have grown their antlers, the herds re-unite, and in Sep- tember the battles begin among the stags for the mastery of the greatest number of hinds. Then among the oaks of Richmond Park there are forerunners of the fights between the stags which are seen a month later on the Scotch mountains. The writer once witnessed a struggle of the kind, when belated in Richmond Park, about 9 o'clock on a moonlight night in September. The moon was up over the Wimbledon hills, and the scene near the pool by the Sheen Gate was so beautiful, that he sat down by a tree to watch the night. In a few minutes a stag came up to the pool and challenged, and was answered by another from the valley, which soon trotted up to the other side of the pond. In a few minutes they charged, and the crash of horns was loud and startling in the still autumn night. After a long scuffle, the new-corner was defeated and chased down the slope towards the brook. It is on the flats by the brook between the Roehampton and Robin Hood Gates that the most for- midable battles usually take place. A large stag generally takes possession of the ground oh either side of the stream, and any invasion of their territory is so keenly resented, that the keeper of the Roehampton Lodge has occa- sionally preferred to make a very wide circuit by the southern path, to crossing the small bridge that leads directly over the brook to his usual beat in the park. When a stag is seen to put out his tongue and let it play rapidly round his lips, it is safe to infer that his temper is dangerous ; and in that case, it is always well to avoid disturbing the hinds. When the red-deer stags reach a certain size, they are removed from Richmond and placed in Windsor Park, for greater safety to the public. There, in September, the writer has seen as many as eighty hinds kept in sole possession by a single stag. At Richmond there are no such predominant masters of the herd, but no one can return from a day spent in observing them without feeling grateful to those who prevented the park being turned into a vast Volunteer camp during the " fence-months."
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