“Away—­away! for hours we did thus hasten on, without once being at fault, or checking our headlong speed.  The chase had led us miles from the starting-point, and now appeared to be bearing up a creek, on one side of which arose a precipitous hill, some two miles in length, which I knew the wounded animal would never ascend.

“Half a mile further on, another hill reared its bleak and barren head on the opposite side of the rivulet.  Once fairly in the gorge, there was no exit save at the upper end of the ravine.  Here, then, I must intercept my game, which I was able to do by taking a nearer cut over the ridge, that saved at least a mile.

“Giving one parting shout to cheer my dog, Cherokee bore me headlong to the pass.  I had scarcely arrived, when, black with sweat, the stag came laboring up the gorge, seemingly, totally reckless of our presence.  Again I poured forth the ‘leaden messenger of death,’ as meteor-like he flashed by us.  One bound, and the noble animal lay prostrate within fifty feet of where I stood.  Leaping from my horse, and placing one knee upon his shoulder, and a hand upon his antlers, I drew my hunting knife; but scarcely had its keen point touched his neck, when, with a sudden bound, he threw me from his body, and my knife was hurled from my hand.  In hunters’ parlance, I had only ‘creased him.’  I at once saw my danger, but it was too late.  With one bound, he was upon me, wounding and almost disabling me with his sharp feet and horns.  I seized him by his wide-spread antlers, and sought to regain possession of my knife, but in vain; each new struggle drew us further from it.  Cherokee, frightened at the unusual scene, had madly fled to the top of the ridge, where he stood looking down upon the combat, trembling and quivering in every limb.

“The ridge road I had taken placed us far in advance of the hound, whose bay I could not now hear.  The struggles of the furious animal had become dreadful, and every moment I could feel his sharp hoofs cutting deep into my flesh; my grasp upon his antlers was growing less and less firm, and yet I relinquished not my hold.  The struggle had brought us near a deep ditch, washed by the fall rains, and into this I endeavored to force my adversary, but my strength was unequal to the effort; when we approached to the very brink, he leaped over the drain.  I relinquished my hold and rolled in, hoping thus to escape him; but he returned to the attack, and, throwing himself upon me, inflicted numerous severe cuts upon my face and breast before I could again seize him.  Locking my arms around his antlers, I drew his head close to my breast, and was thus, by great effort, enabled to prevent his doing me any serious injury.  But I felt that this could not last long; every muscle and fiber of my frame was called into action, and human nature could not long bear up under such exertion.  Faltering a silent prayer to Heaven, I prepared to meet my fate.