Lying hidden in one of these lonely _puestos_--writes J. C. C.--ever induces in me a powerful and sedative sense of contemplation and reflection, though fully alert all the time. While thus waiting and watching, I can't but marvel, first at nature's wondrous plan of waste--a scheme here without apparent object or promise of fulfilment. Where I lie the prospect comprises nothing but melancholy and unutterably silent solitudes of sand, droughty wastes with but at rare intervals some starveling patch of scant weird shrub destined either to shrivel in summer's sun or shiver in winter's winds. But, lying in that environment, one marvels yet more at the extreme caution displayed by wild animals; one has exceptional opportunity of admiring the exquisitive gifts bestowed by nature upon her _ferae_. Here is a young stag coming straight along, down-wind, ere yet the beat has begun, and in a desolate spot which to human sense could betray absolutely no feature or taint of danger. Suddenly he becomes rigid, arrested in mid-career--sniffing at a pure untainted air, yet conscious somehow of something wrong somewhere! It is a miraculous gift, though one cannot but feel grateful that we humans are devoid of senses that ever keep nerves in highest tension. Here is a sketch of a non-shootable stag thus suddenly statuetted thirty yards from me snugly hidden well down-wind, and so intensely interested that _something else_ (a very old pal) well-nigh escaped notice. [Illustration: ALTABACA (_Scrofularia_) The starveling shrub that grows in sand.] [Illustration: TOMILLO DE ARENA Another sand-plant (in spring has a lovely pink bloom like sea-thrift).] That something was our good friend Reynard--_Zorro_ they style him out here--whose proverbial cunning exceeds all other cunnings. He has come down to my track and there stopped dead, expressing in every detail the very essence of doubly-distilled subtlety and craft. At those footprints he halts, sniffs the wind, curls his brush dubiously--as a cat will do when pleased--but not sure yet of his next move. One second's consideration decides him and it is executed at once--he is off like a gust of wind. But a Paradox ball at easy range in the open broke a hind-leg, and it was curious to note his evolutions--he, poor fellow, not realising what had occurred, flung himself round and round in rapid gyrations, the while biting at his own hind-leg. Needless to say not an instant passed ere a second ball terminated his sufferings. To observe the beautiful traits in the habits of wild beasts is to me quite as great a joy as adding them to my score and immensely augments the enjoyment of a big-game drive. [Illustration: "WHAT'S THIS?"] RED DEER HEADS--_COTO DOÑANA_.