THE MONARCH OF THE GLEN
An annual visit to the Scottish Highlands
was one of Landseer’s pleasures. It was
here that he learned to know the habits of the deer,
the subject of many of his noblest paintings.
His first journey to this region was as a young man
of twenty-two, in company with a friend and fellow
painter, Leslie. An incident of the excursion
was a visit to Abbotsford, the home of Sir Walter
Scott. The painter and the novelist had much
in common in their attachment to dogs, their fondness
for vigorous out-of-door exercise, and their love of
nature.
Landseer was deeply impressed with
the rugged grandeur of the Highland scenery.
Especially was his imagination stirred by the mountain
solitudes, the haunt of the deer, which Scott had described
in his poems. A favorite resort was the valley
of Glencoe, a singularly wild and romantic spot where
a long narrow ravine is shut in between almost perpendicular
hills.
The painter first made the acquaintance
of the deer after the ordinary manner of the sportsman.
For sport in itself, however, he cared little or nothing;
the great attraction of hunting was the chance to study
the action of animals. His friends laughed at
him for a poor shot, but his true weapon was the pencil,
not the gun. One day, while deerstalking, just
as a magnificent shot came his way, the gillies were
astonished to have the painter thrust the gun into
their hands, and hastily take out his sketch-book.
It was the life and not the death of the animal in
which he was chiefly interested.
The Monarch of the Glen seems to be
a picture caught in just this way. The very life
and character of the animal are transferred to the
canvas as by a snap shot of the camera. The stag
has heard some strange sound or scented some new danger,
and, mounting a hill, looks abroad to see if all is
well. The responsibility of the herd is his,
and he has a tender care for the doe and the young
deer. He must always be on the alert.
His attitude reminds one of Scott’s
“antlered monarch” in “The Lady of
the Lake,” which
“Like crested leader proud and high
Tossed his beamed frontlet to the sky;
A moment gazed adown the dale,
A moment snuffed the tainted gale.”
It is with a proud sense of ownership
that the monarch surveys his domain. With head
erect he seems to defy the whole world of sportsmen.
Behind him are piled the massive crags of the mountain
peaks, with the mist rising from the valley below.
This fog, so dangerous to the traveller, is a blessing
to the deer, tempering the heat of the summer sun
and hiding him from his enemy, man. It appealed
to Landseer on account of its weird sublimity, and
he liked to get the effect of it in his landscapes,
especially when illumined by a burst of sunlight.
The Monarch of the Glen is a splendid
specimen of his kind. The spreading horns above
his head are like the boughs of an oak tree. We
know from the number of branches that he is seven years
old. The horns are developed at the end of the
first year, and every year thereafter are displaced
by new ones with an additional branch.
The large ears are held erect as if
the animal could fairly see with them. His fine
eyes scan the horizon with a searching glance which
misses nothing. His sensitive nose detects from
afar the approach of any stranger to his fastnesses.
The end is always moist, in order that he may catch
the way of the wind, as the hunter catches it on his
moistened finger. His neck is encircled with a
heavy mane, falling in a broad band, like the collar
of a royal order. His body is rather short, thick,
and round.
The legs, which are seen only half
their length, seem strangely disproportioned to the
weight of so heavy an annual. That the deer’s
horns are so large and his legs so small are two perpetual
mysteries about this wild creature. An amusing
fable by La Fontaine relates how a stag, gazing at
his reflection in the water, deplores the awkwardness
of his legs, and admires the beauty of his antlers.
A moment later, fleeing for his life, he learns the
value of his despised legs, while the boasted horns
impede his progress by catching in the branches of
the forest trees.
The speed of which the deer is capable
is indeed marvelous. He adds to his power of
fleet running a wonderful trick of bounding through
space. It is said that a deer may leap six or
eight feet into the air, and cover in a single bound
a distance of eighteen to thirty feet. The leap
is performed without apparent haste or effort, the
animal rising gracefully into the air by a tiny toe-touch
of the dainty hoofs. It is a sort of wingless
flying. The deer is besides a strong swimmer, and
lakes and streams are no obstacles in his way.
As we look into the noble face of
the Monarch of the Glen, we feel a sense of kinship
with him, like the experience of Yan in the beautiful
story of “The Sandhill Stag.” It was
after following the trail of the deer many days that
the youth at last came suddenly face to face with
the object of his desire, “a wondrous pair of
bronze and ivory horns, a royal head, a noble form
behind it.” As they gazed into each other’s
eyes, every thought of murder went out of Yan’s
heart, and gave place to a strange sense of fellowship.
“Go now without fear,” he said, “but
if only you would come sometimes and look me in the
eyes, and make me feel as you have done to-day, you
would drive the wild beast wholly from my heart, and
then the veil would be a little drawn, and I should
know more of the things that wise men have prayed for
knowledge of.”