The colour of both STAG and HIND is a dingy red, with darker tints about the eyes and mouth: down the upper part of the neck, and over the points of the shoulders, is a shade of dark brown, bordering upon black: the countenance is commandingly expressive; the eye beautifully brilliant, even to poetic celebrity; and his senses of _smelling_ and _hearing_ equal to any animal of this country. When in the least alarmed, his position is the most majestic; he raises his head to the highest pitch, erects his ears, swells his neck, extends his nostrils, and snuffs the air, as if in curious and impatient investigation of the cause by which it was occasioned. Let this be what it may, he never takes to sudden flight, without first measuring, by his _eye_ and _ear_, the magnitude of the danger, and proceeds accordingly. If dogs are not of the party, men, cattle, or carriages, seem to give him little or no concern; for, after turning twice or thrice, to take a repeated survey with a kind of confused admiration, he moves off very deliberately, without any alarming sensation. The season for copulation with the deer tribe (see "RUTTING TIME") begins at the latter end of August and beginning of September, and terminates in the beginning or middle of October; depending, in that respect, a little upon the state of the season, and the ages of the different head of deer; those of two and three years old being backwarder, of course extending the time beyond those who are older. From the moment of conception with the hind, to the time of parturition, is nearly nine lunar months; as they produce in the last week in MAY, or one of the two first in JUNE. Immediately after impregnation, she separates herself from the STAG; no intercourse takes place; even common association ceases; and nothing during the period of gestation ensues, but mutual and marked indifference. The hind is seldom or ever known to produce more than one, (which is called a CALF:) this she deposits in the most remote, sequestered, and best sheltered spot to be procured, for the purpose of secretion from its numerous enemies, amongst whom there is none more determined or malicious than the masculine occasion of its existence, even the sire himself. Mysterious as this may appear, it is an unexaggerated fact; and the dam, perfectly conscious of the stag's unnatural propensity, is more industrious to conceal the calf's retreat from him, than the aggregate of its other enemies.