STAG'S ADVENTURES

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21580, 26 August 1933, Page 3 (Supplement)

STAG'S ADVENTURES

HUNTED OUT OF ENGLAND NINE YEARS OF PEACE A British stag recently died in France after an adventurous career. In 1924 the West Kent Staghounds hunted him down to the shore, and, rather than face the hounds, he swam out to sea. People thought he would drown, because he must hare been weary when he took to the water, but the desire for life was strong in him, and he held on. The crew of a French trawler were amazed to meet a stag in mid-Channel. Their captain was a kindly man, and the deer was hauled aboard, and taken on the trawler to Dunkirk. But now, the stag, which had escaped being torn by the hounds, butchered by the huntsman, and drowned by the sea, seemed likely to be hanged by red tape. Someone told the captain he was liable to a heavy fine for carrying live cargo. The captain asked the French Ministry of Agriculture to relieve him of the deer, but was told it was impossible, because the animal was not French. The Ministry suggested shooting, but the police said it was the close season for deer, and so the stag escaped that fate. Then the master of the West Kent Staghounds was asked to take the deer, but he could not, because the stng would have had to remain in quarantine for six months, and no one seemed anxious to pay for his keep. So the stag had another escape. Then a kind-hearted Frenchman came forward offering to adopt the stag, and brave all the official consequences. The captain of the trawler and the Mayor of Dunkirk were delighted to be rid' of the animal. For the last nine years the stag lived in a park at Le Touquet, where he had French deer for company. His owner kept a restaurant, but he never dreamed of making the British stag into venison pie. Not thus, he held, should France treat those who sought asylum on her hospitable shores! Now the stag who was hunted out of Britain by the good Kent hunters has died of old age.