OF THE BUCK AND OF HIS NATURE
A buck is a diverse beast, he hath not his hair as a hart, for he is
more white, and also he hath not such a head. He is less than a hart
and is larger than a roe. A buck's head is palmed with a long palming,
and he beareth more tines than doth a hart. His head cannot be well
described without painting. They have a longer tail than the hart, and
more grease on their haunches than a hart. They are fawned in the
month of June and shortly to say they have the nature of the hart,
save only that the hart goeth sooner to rut and is sooner in his
season again, also in all things of their kind the hart goeth before
the buck. For when the hart hath been fifteen days at rut the buck
scarcely beginneth to be in heat and bellow.
And also men go not to sue him with a lymer, nor do men go to harbour
him as men do to the hart. Nor are his fumes put in judgment as those
of the hart, but men judge him by the foot other head as I shall say
more plainly hereafter.
[Illustration: BUCK-HUNTING WITH RUNNING HOUNDS (From MS. f. fr. 616,
_Bib. Nat._, Paris)]
They crotey their fumes in diverse manners according to the time and
pasture, as doth the hart, but oftener black and dry than otherwise.
When they are hunted they bound again into their coverts and fly not
so long as doth the hart, for sometimes they run upon the hounds.[54]
And they run long and fly ever if they can by the high ways and always
with the change. They let themselves be taken at the water and beat
the brooks as a hart, but not with such great malice as the hart, nor
so gynnously (cunningly) and also they go not to such great rivers as
the hart. They run faster at the beginning than doth the hart. They
bolk (bellow) about when they go to rut, not as a hart doth, but much
lower than the hart, and rattling in the throat. Their nature and that
of the hart do not love (to be) together, for gladly would they not
dwell there where many harts be, nor the harts there where the bucks
be namely together in herds. The buck's flesh is more savoury[55] than
is that of the hart or of the roebuck. The venison of them is right
good if kept and salted as that of the hart. They abide oft in a dry
country and always commonly in herd with other bucks. Their season
lasteth from the month of May into the middle of September. And
commonly they dwell in a high country where there be valleys and small
hills. He is undone as the hart.
[54] They do not make such a long flight as the red deer but by
ringing return to the hounds.
[55] G. de F., p. 29, completes the sense of this sentence by saying
that "the flesh of the buck is more savoury to all hounds than that of
the stag or of the roe, and for this reason it is a bad change to hunt
the stag with hounds which at some other time have eaten buck."