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OUTDOOR PASTIMES OF AN
AMERICAN HUNTER
BOOKS BY THEODORE ROOSEVELT
PUBLISHED BT CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
OUTDOOR PASTIMES OF AN AMERICAN HUNTER.
New Edition. Illustrated. 8vo . . $3.00 net.
OLIVER CROMWELL. Illustrated. 8vo . . . $2.00
THE ROUGH RIDERS. Illustrated. 8vo . . $1.50
THE ROOSEVELT BOOK. Selections from the Writ-
ings of Theodore Roosevelt. 16mo . 50 cents net
G>/Hfr,^M. M/lt /„/ /;A.-/r//^i/. ATm-Yorft.
OUTDOOR PASTIMES
OF AN
AMERICAN HUNTER
BY
THEODORE ROOSEVELT
ILLUSTRATED
NEW AND ENLARGED EDITION
NEW YORK
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
1908
i LIBRARY of CONGriESS
Two Copies Retv:V«'.<
FEB 1 !d08
OUSSA XXc. Aiu
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COPYRIGHT, 1893, 1895, 1897, 1904, BY
FOREST AND STREAM PUBLISHING COMPANY
COPYRIGHT, 1902, BY THE
MACMILLAN COMPANY
COPYRIGHT, 1905, 1907, 1908, BY
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
All rights reserved
I
INTRODUCTION TO SECOND EDITION
Chapters XII and XIII relate to experiences that occurred
since the first edition of this volume was published. The
photographs in Chapter XII were taken by Dr. Alexander
Lambert; those in Chapter XIII by Mrs. Herbert Wadsworth
and Mr. Clinedinst.
Theodore Roosevelt.
The White House, January I, 1908.
TO
JOHN BURROUGHS
Dear Oom John : — Every lover of outdoor life must feel
a sense of affectionate obligation to you. Your writings appeal
to all w^ho care for the life of the vv^oods and the fields, whether
their tastes keep them in the homely, pleasant farm country or
lead them into the wilderness. It is a good thing for our peo-
ple that you should have lived ; and surely no man can wish
to have more said of him.
I wish to express my hearty appreciation of your warfare
against the sham nature-writers — those whom you have called
" the yellow journalists of the woods." From the days of ^sop
to the days of Reinecke Fuchs, and from the days of Reinecke
Fuchs to the present time, there has been a distinct and attrac-
tive place in literature for those who write avowed fiction in
which the heroes are animals with human or semi-human attri-
butes. This fiction serves a useful purpose in many ways, even
in the way of encouraging people to take the right view of out-
door life and outdoor creatures ; but it is unpardonable for any
observer of nature to write fiction and then publish it as truth,
and he who exposes and wars against such action is entitled to
respect and support. You in your own person have illustrated
what can be done by the lover of nature who has trained him-
self to keen observation, who describes accurately what is thus
observed, and who, finally, possesses the additional gift of writ-
ing with charm and interest.
You were with me on one of the trips described in this
volume, and I trust that to look over it will recall the pleasant
days we spent together.
Your friend,
Theodore Roosevelt.
The White House, October 2, 1905.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
PAGE
With the Cougar Hounds i
CHAPTER II
A Colorado Bear Hunt 68
CHAPTER III
Wolf-Coursing . . lOO
CHAPTER IV
Hunting in the Cattle Country; The Prongbuck 133
CHAPTER V
A Shot at a Mountain Sheep 181
CHAPTER VI
The Whitetail Deer 193
CHAPTER VII
The Mule-Deer or Rocky Mountain Blacktail . 224
xi
xii CONTENTS
CHAPTER VIII
PAGE
The Wapiti or Round-Horned Elk 256
CHAPTER IX
Wilderness Reserves; The Yellowstone Park. . 287
CHAPTER X
Books on Big Game 318
CHAPTER XI
At Home 339
CHAPTER XII
In the Louisiana Canebrakes 360
CHAPTER XIII
Small Country Neighbors c 391
*^* Seven of these Chapters have been recently written ; the others have
been revised and added to since they originally appeared in the publications of
the Boone and Crockett Club and in Mr. Caspar Whitney's "Deer Family."
ILLUSTRATIONS
Theodore Roosevelt Frontispiece ^
Photogravure from a photograph. facing
PAGE
GOFF AND THE PaCK 5 .
Turk and a Bobcat in Top of a Pinyon ...... 12 ^
Bobcat in Pinyon 16 /
Starting for a Hunt 33 .
The First Cougar Killed 37^
After the Fight 44 /
Cougar in a Tree 50
Barking Treed 63 /
Starting for Camp 68 '
At Dinner 7^ -^
The Pack Strikes the Fresh Bear Trail 77
Death of the Big Bear 83 /
Stewart and the Bobcat 86
The Pack Baying the Bear 88
A Doily Bear gi
The Big Bear 94
Starting Toward the Wolf Grounds loi
Greyhounds Resting after a Run 104
xiii
xiv ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING
PAGE
At the Tail of the Chuck Wagon io8
The Big D Cow Pony H2
Abernethy and Coyote ii6
Abernethy Returns from the Hunt 125
Bony Moore and the Coyote 129
On the Little Missouri 138
Camping on the Antelope Grounds 156
Ranch Wagon Returning from Hunt 182.
Elkhorn Ranch 216
The Ranch House 238
The Ranch Veranda 248
The Pack Train 264
Trophies of a Successful Hunt 277
Trophies in the White House Dining-Room 284
Antelope in the Streets of Gardiner 294
Blacktail Deer on Parade Ground 299
Elk in Snow 304
Oom John 309
Bears and Tourists 311
Grizzly Bear and Cook 314
The Bear and the Chambermaid 316
The North Room at Sagamore Hill 324
Renown 341
His First Buck , . , 343
Algonquin and Skip 344
ILLUSTRATIONS xv
FACING
PAGE
Peter Rabbit 346 -'
The Guinea Pigs 348 ^
Family Friends 350^
JosiAH 354/
Bleistein Jumping 356 .
The Bear Hunters 366^
Listening for the Pack 376 ^
Audrey Takes the Bars 394
The Stone Wall 402 /
RoswELL Behaves Like a Gentleman \^A /
RoswELL Fights for His Head 418 /
*^* The cuts for Chapter I are from photographs taken by Philip B.
Stewart ; those in Chapter II, from photographs taken by Dr. Alexander
Lambert and Philip B. Stewart ; those in Chapter III, from photographs
taken by Dr. Lambert and Sloan Simpson ; those in Chapter IX were ob-
tained through Major Pitcher ; most of the others are from photographs taken
by me or by members of my family.
OUTDOOR PASTIMES OF
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
CHAPTER I
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS
In January, 1901, I started on a five weeks' cougar
hunt from Meeker in Northwest Colorado. My com-
panions were Mr. Philip B. Stewart and Dr. Gerald
Webb, of Colorado Springs; Stewart was the captain of
the victorious Yale nine of '86. We reached Meeker on
January nth, after a forty mile drive from the railroad,
through the bitter winter weather ; it was eighteen degrees
below zero when we started. At Meeker we met John
B. Goff, the hunter, and left town the next morning on
horseback for his ranch, our hunting beginning that same
afternoon, when after a brisk run our dogs treed a bobcat.
After a fortnight Stewart and Webb returned, Goff and
I staying out three weeks longer. We did not have to
camp out, thanks to the warm-hearted hospitality of the
proprietor and manager of the Keystone Ranch, and of
the Mathes Brothers and Judge Foreman, both of whose
ranches I also visited. The five weeks were spent hunt-
ing north of the White River, most of the time in the
neighborhood of Coyote Basin and Colorow Mountain.
In midwinter, hunting on horseback in the Rockies is
2 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
apt to be cold work, but we were too warmly clad to
mind the weather. We wore heavy flannels, jackets lined
with sheepskin, caps which drew down entirely over our
ears, and on our feet heavy ordinary socks, german socks,
and overshoes. Galloping through the brush and among
the spikes of the dead cedars, meant that now and then
one got snagged; I found tough overalls better than
trousers; and most of the time I did not need the jacket,
wearing my old buckskin shirt, which is to my mind a
particularly useful and comfortable garment.
It is a high, dry country, where the winters are usually
very cold, but the snow not under ordinary circumstances
very deep. It is wild and broken in character, the hills
and low mountains rising in sheer slopes, broken by cliffs
and riven by deeply cut and gloomy gorges and ravines.
The sage-brush grows everj^where upon the flats and
hillsides. Large open groves of pinyon and cedar are
scattered over the peaks, ridges, and table-lands. Tall
spruces cluster in the cold ravines. Cottonwoods grow
along the stream courses, and there are occasional patches
of scrub-oak and quaking asp. The entire country is
taken up with cattle ranges wherever it is possible to get
a sufficient water-supply, natural or artificial. Some
thirty miles to the east and north the mountains rise
higher, the evergreen forest becomes continuous, the snow
lies deep all through the winter, and such Northern
animals as the wolverene, lucivee, and snow-shoe rabbit
are found. This high country is the summer home of the
Colorado elk, now woefully diminished in numbers, and
of the Colorado blacktail deer, which are still very plenti-
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 3
ful, but which, unless better protected, will follow the elk
in the next few decades. I am happy to say that there are
now signs to show that the State is waking up to the need
of protecting both elk and deer; the few remaining
mountain sheep in Colorado are so successfully pro-
tected that they are said to be increasing in numbers. In
winter both elk and deer come down to the lower country,
through a part of which I made my hunting trip. We
did not come across any elk, but I have never, even in
the old days, seen blacktail more abundant than they were
in this region. The bucks had not lost their antlers, and
were generally, but not always, found in small troops
by themselves; the does, yearlings, and fawns — now al-
most yearlings themselves — went in bands. They seemed
tame, and we often passed close to them before they took
alarm. Of course at that season it was against the law
to kill them; and even had this not been so none of our
party would have dreamed of molesting them.
Flocks of Alaskan long-spurs and of rosy finches
flitted around the ranch buildings ; but at that season there
was not very much small bird life.
The midwinter mountain landscape was very beauti-
ful, whether under the brilliant blue sky of the day, or
the starlight or glorious moonlight of the night, or when
under the dying sun the snowy peaks, and the light clouds
above, kindled into flame, and sank again to gold and
amber and sombre purple. After the snow-storms the
trees, almost hidden beneath the light, feathery masses,
gave a new and strange look to the mountains, as if
they were giant masses of frosted silver. Even the
4 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
storms had a beauty of their own. The keen, cold air,
the wonderful scenery, and the interest and excitement of
the sport, made our veins thrill and beat with buoyant
life.
In cougar hunting the success of the hunter depends
absolutely upon his hounds. As hounds that are not per-
fectly trained are worse than useless, this means that
success depends absolutely upon the man who trains and
hunts the hounds. Goflf was one of the best hunters with
whom I have ever been out, and he had trained his pack
to a point of perfection for its special work which I have
never known another such pack to reach. With the ex-
ception of one new hound, which he had just purchased,
and of a puppy, which was being trained, not one of the
pack would look at a deer even when they were all as
keen as mustard, were not on a trail, and when the deer
got up but fifty yards or so from them. By the end of
the hunt both the new hound and the puppy were entirely
trustworthy; of course, Goff can only keep up his pack
by continually including new or young dogs with the
veterans. As cougar are only plentiful where deer are
infinitely more plentiful, the first requisite for a good
cougar hound is that it shall leave its natural prey, the
deer, entirely alone. Gofif's pack ran only bear, cougar,
and bobcat. Under no circumstances were they ever per-
mitted to follow elk, deer, antelope or, of course, rabbit.
Nor were they allowed to follow a wolf unless it was
wounded ; for in such a rough country they would at once
run out of sight and hearing, and moreover if they did
overtake the wolf they would be so scattered as to come
GOFF AND THE PACK
From a photograph by Philip B. Stewart
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 5
up singly and probably be overcome one after another.
Being bold dogs they were always especially eager after
wolf and coyote, and when they came across the trail of
either, though they would not follow it, they would
usually challenge loudly. If the circumstances were such
that they could overtake the wolf in a body, it could make
no effective fight against them, no matter how large and
powerful. On the one or two occasions when this had
occurred, the pack had throttled " Isegrim " without get-
ting a scratch.
As the dogs did all the work, we naturally became
extremely interested in them, and rapidly grew to know
the voice, peculiarities, and special abilities of each.
There were eight hounds and four fighting dogs. The
hounds were of the ordinary Eastern type, used from the
Adirondacks to the Mississippi and the Gulf in the chase
of deer and fox. Six of them were black and tan and
two were mottled. They differed widely in size and
voice. The biggest, and, on the whole, the most useful,
was Jim, a very fast, powerful, and true dog with a great
voice. When the animal was treed or bayed, Jim was
especially useful because he never stopped barking; and
we could only find the hounds, when at bay, by listening
for the sound of their voices. Among the clififs and preci-
pices the pack usually ran out of sight and hearing if
the chase lasted any length of time. Their business was
to bring the quarry to bay, or put it up a tree, and then
to stay with it and make a noise until the hunters came
up. During this hunt there were two or three occasions
when they had a cougar up a tree for at least three hours
6 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
before we arrived, and on several occasions Gofif had
known them to keep a cougar up a tree overnight and
to be still barking around the tree when the hunters at
last found them the following morning. Jim always
did his share of the killing, being a formidable fighter,
though too wary to take hold until one of the professional
fighting dogs had seized. He was a great bully with the
other dogs, robbing them of their food, and yielding only
to Turk. He possessed great endurance, and very stout
feet.
On the whole the most useful dog next to Jim was
old Boxer. Age had made Boxer slow, and in addition
to this, the first cougar we tackled bit him through one
hind leg, so that for the remainder of the trip he went
on three legs, or, as Goff put it, " packed one leg " ; but
this seemed not to interfere with his appetite, his en-
durance, or his desire for the chase. Of all the dogs he
was the best to puzzle out a cold trail on a bare hill-
side, or in any difficult place. He hardly paid any heed
to the others, always insisting upon working out the trail
for himself, and he never gave up. Of course, the dogs
were much more apt to come upon the cold than upon
the fresh trail of a cougar, and it was often necessary
for them to spend several hours in working out a track
which was at least two days old. Both Boxer and Jim
had enormous appetites. Boxer was a small dog and
Jim a very large one, and as the relations of the pack
among themselves were those of brutal wild-beast selfish-
ness. Boxer had to eat very quickly if he expected to get
anything when Jim was around. He never ventured to
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 7
fight Jim, but in deep-toned voice appealed to heaven
against the unrighteousness with which he was treated;
and time and again such appeal caused me to sally out
and rescue his dinner from Jim's highway robbery.
Once, when Boxer was given a biscuit, which he tried
to bolt whole, Jim simply took his entire head in his
jaws, and convinced him that he had his choice of sur-
rendering the biscuit, or sharing its passage down Jim's
capacious throat. Boxer promptly gave up the biscuit,
then lay on his back and wailed a protest to fate — his
voice being deep rather than loud, so that on the trail,
when heard at a distance, it sounded a little as if he
was croaking. After killing a cougar we usually cut up
the carcass and fed it to the dogs, if we did not expect
another chase that day. They devoured it eagerly. Boxer,
after his meal, always looking as if he had swallowed
a mattress.
Next in size to Jim was Tree'em. Tree'em was a
good dog, but I never considered him remarkable until
his feat on the last day of our hunt, to be afterward
related. He was not a very noisy dog, and when " bark-
ing treed " he had a meditative way of giving single
barks separated by intervals of several seconds, all the
time gazing stolidly up at the big, sinister cat which he
was baying. Early in the hunt, in the course of a fight
with one of the cougars, he received some injury to his
tail, which made it hang down like a piece of old rope.
Apparently it hurt him a good deal and we let him rest
for a fortnight. This put him in great spirits and made
him fat and strong, but only enabled him to recover
8 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
power over the root of the tail, while the tip hung down
as before; it looked like a curved pump-handle when he
tried to carry it erect.
Lil and Nel were two very stanch and fast bitches,
the only two dogs that could keep up to Jim in a quick
burst. They had shrill voices. Their only failing was a
tendency to let the other members of the pack cow them so
that they did not get their full share of the food. It
was not a pack in which a slow or timid dog had much
chance for existence. They would all unite in the chase
and the fierce struggle which usually closed it; but the
instant the quarry was killed each dog resumed his nor-
mal attitude of greedy anger or greedy fear toward the
others.
Another bitch rejoiced in the not very appropriate
name of Pete. She was a most ardent huntress. In the
middle of our trip she gave birth to a litter of puppies,
but before they were two weeks old she would slip away
after us and join with the utmost ardor in the hunting
and fighting. Her brother Jimmie, although of the same
age (both were young) , was not nearly as far advanced.
He would run well on a fresh trail, but a cold trail or a
long check always discouraged him and made him come
back to Gofif. He was rapidly learning; a single beating
taught him to let deer alone. The remaining hound,
Bruno, had just been added to the pack. He showed ten-
dencies both to muteness and babbling, and at times, if he
thought himself unobserved, could not resist making a
sprint after a deer; but he occasionally rendered good
service. If Jim or Boxer gave tongue every member of
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 9
the pack ran to the sound; but not a dog paid any heed
to Jimmie or Bruno. Yet both ultimately became first-
class hounds.
The fighting dogs always trotted at the heels of the
horses, which had become entirely accustomed to them,
and made no objection when they literally rubbed against
their heels. The fighters never left us until we came to
where we could hear the hounds " barking treed," or
with their quarry at bay. Then they tore in a straight
line to the sound. They were the ones who were expected
to do the seizing and take the punishment, though the
minute they actually had hold of the cougar, the hounds
all piled on too, and did their share of the killing; but
the seizers fought the head while the hounds generally
took hold behind. All of them, fighters and hounds alike,
were exceedingly good-natured and affectionate with
their human friends, though short-tempered to a degree
with one another. The best of the fighters was old Turk,
who was by blood half hound and half " Siberian blood-
hound." Both his father and his mother were half-breeds
of the same strains, and both were famous fighters.
Once, when Gofif had wounded an enormous gray wolf
in the hind leg, the father had overtaken it and fought
it to a standstill. The two dogs together were an over-
match for any wolf. Turk had had a sister who was as
good as he was; but she had been killed the year before
by a cougar which bit her through the skull; accidents
being, of course, frequent in the pack, for a big cougar
is an even more formidable opponent to dogs than a
wolf. Turk's head and body were seamed with scars.
lo AN AMERICAN HUNTER
He had lost his lower fangs, but he was still a most for-
midable dog. While we were at the Keystone Ranch
a big steer which had been driven in, got on the fight,
and the foreman, William Wilson, took Turk out to aid
him. At first Turk did not grasp what was expected of
him, because all the dogs were trained never to touch
anything domestic — at the different ranches where we
stopped the cats and kittens wandered about, perfectly
safe, in the midst of this hard-biting crew of bear and
cougar fighters. But when Turk at last realized that
he was expected to seize the steer, he did the business
with speed and thoroughness; he not only threw the steer,
but would have killed it then and there had he not been,
with much difficulty, taken away. Three dogs like Turk,
in their prime and with their teeth intact, could, I be-
lieve, kill an ordinary female cougar, and could hold
even a big male so as to allow it to be killed with the
knife.
Next to Turk were two half-breeds between bull and
shepherd, named Tony and Baldy. They were exceed-
ingly game, knowing-looking little dogs, with a certain
alert swagger that reminded one of the walk of some
light-weight prize-fighters. In fights with cougars,
bears, and lynx, they too had been badly mauled and had
lost a good many of their teeth. Neither of the gallant
little fellows survived the trip. Their place was taken
by a white bulldog bitch, Queen, which we picked up
at the Keystone Ranch; a very affectionate and good-
humored dog, but, when her blood was aroused, a daunt-
less though rather stupid fighter. Unfortunately she did
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS ii
not seize by the head, taking hold of any part that was
nearest.
The pack had many interesting peculiarities, but none
more so than the fact that four of them climbed trees.
Only one of the hounds, little Jimmie, ever tried the feat;
but of the fighters, not only Tony and Baldy but big
Turk climbed every tree that gave them any chance.
The pinyons and cedars were low, multi-forked, and
usually sent off branches from near the ground. In con-
sequence the dogs could, by industrious effort, work their
way almost to the top. The photograph of Turk and the
bobcat in the pinyon (facing p. 12) shows them at an alti-
tude of about thirty feet above the ground. Now and
then a dog would lose his footing and come down with a
whack which sounded as if he must be disabled, but after
a growl and a shake he would start up the tree again.
They could not fight well while in a tree, and were often
scratched or knocked to the ground by a cougar; and
when the quarry was shot out of its perch and seized
by the expectant throng below, the dogs in the tree, yelp-
ing with eager excitement, dived headlong down through
the branches, regardless of consequences.
The horses were stout, hardy, surefooted beasts, not
very fast, but able to climb like goats, and to endure an
immense amount of work. Goff and I each used two for
the trip.
The bear were all holed up for the winter, and so
our game was limited to cougars and bobcats. In the
books the bobcat is always called a lynx, which it of
course is; but whenever a hunter or trapper speaks of a
12 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
lynx (which he usually calls " link," feeling dimly that
the other pronunciation is a plural), he means a lucivee.
Bobcat is a good distinctive name, and it is one which
I think the book people might with advantage adopt;
for wild-cat, which is the name given to the small lynx
in the East, is already pre-empted by the true wild-cat
of Europe. Like all people of European descent who
have gone into strange lands, we Americans have christ-
ened our wild beasts with a fine disregard for their
specific and generic relations. We called the bison
" buffalo " as long as it existed, and we still call the big
stag an " elk," instead of using for it the excellent term
wapiti; on the other hand, to the true elk and the rein-
deer we gave the new names moose and caribou — ex-
cellent names, too, by the way. The prong buck is always
called antelope, though it is not an antelope at all; and
the white goat is not a goat; while the distinctive name of
" bighorn " is rarely used for the mountain sheep. In
most cases, however, it is mere pedantry to try to upset
popular custom in such matters; and where, as with the
bobcat, a perfectly good name is taken, it would be better
for scientific men to adopt it. I may add that in this
particular of nomenclature we are no worse sinners than
other people. The English in Ceylon, the English and
Dutch in South Africa, and the Spanish in South Amer-
ica, have all shown the same genius for misnaming beasts
and birds.
Bobcats were very numerous where we were hunting.
They fed chiefly upon the rabbits, which fairly swarmed;
mostly cotton-tails, but a few jacks. Contrary to the
TURK AND A BOBCAT IN TOP OF A PINYON
From a photograph by Philip B. Stewart
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 13
popular belief, the winter is in many places a time of
plenty for carnivorous wild beasts. In this place, for
instance, the abundance of deer and rabbits made good
hunting for both cougar and bobcat, and all those we
killed were as fat as possible, and in consequence weighed
more than their inches promised. The bobcats are very
fond of prairie dogs, and haunt the dog towns as soon
as spring comes and the inhabitants emerge from their
hibernation. They sometimes pounce on higher game.
We came upon an eight months' fawn — very nearly a
yearling — which had been killed by a big male bobcat;
and Judge Foreman informed me that near his ranch,
a few years previously, an exceptionally large bobcat had
killed a yearling doe. Bobcats will also take lambs and
young pigs, and if the chance occurs will readily seize
their small kinsman, the house cat.
Bobcats are very fond of lurking round prairie-dog
towns as soon as the prairie dogs come out in spring.
In this part of Colorado, by the way, the prairie dogs
were of an entirely different species from the common
kind of the plains east of the Rockies.
We found that the bobcats sometimes made their lairs
along the rocky ledges or in holes in the cut banks, and
sometimes in thickets, prowling about during the night,
and now and then even during the day. We never chased
them unless the dogs happened to run across them by
accident when questing for cougar, or when we were re-
turning home after a day when we had failed to find
cougar. Usually the cat gave a good run, occasionally
throwing out the dogs by doubling or jack-knifing. Two
14 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
or three times one of them gave us an hour's sharp trot-
ting, cantering, and galloping through the open cedar
and pinyon groves on the table-lands; and the runs some-
times lasted for a much longer period when the dogs had
to go across ledges and through deep ravines.
On one of our runs a party of ravens fluttered along
from tree to tree beside us, making queer gurgling noises
and evidently aware that they might expect to reap a
reward from our hunting. Ravens, multitudes of mag-
pies, and golden and bald eagles were seen continually,
and all four flocked to any carcass which was left in the
open. The eagle and the raven are true birds of the
wilderness, and in a way their presence both height-
ened and relieved the iron desolation of the wintry
mountains.
Over half the cats we started escaped, getting into
caves or deep holes in washouts. In the other instances
they went up trees and were of course easily shot. Tony
and Baldy would bring them out of any hole into which
they themselves could get. After their loss, Lil, who was
a small hound, once went into a hole in a washout after
a cat. After awhile she stopped barking, though we
could still hear the cat growling. What had happened
to her we did not know. We spent a couple of hours
calling to her and trying to get her to come out, but she
neither came out nor answered, and, as sunset was ap-
proaching and the ranch was some miles off, we rode
back there, intending to return with spades in the morn-
ing. However, by breakfast we found that Lil had come
back. We supposed that she had got on the other side
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 15
of the cat and had been afraid or unable to attack it; so
that as Collins the cow-puncher, who was a Southerner,
phrased it, " she just naturally stayed in the hole " until
some time during the night the cat went out and she fol-
lowed. When once hunters and hounds have come into
the land, it is evident that the bobcats which take refuge
in caves have a far better chance of surviving than those
which make their lairs in the open and go up trees. But
trees are sure havens against their wilderness foes. Gofif
informed me that he once came in the snow to a place
where the tracks showed that some coyotes had put a
bobcat up a tree, and had finally abandoned the effort to
get at it. Any good fighting dog will kill a bobcat;
but an untrained dog, even of large size, will probably
fail, as the bobcat makes good use of both teeth and
claws. The cats we caught frequently left marks on some
of the pack. We found them very variable in size. My
two largest — both of course males — weighed respectively
thirty-one and thirty-nine pounds. The latter, Goff said,
was of exceptional size, and as large as any he had ever
killed. The full-grown females went down as low as
eighteen pounds, or even lower.
When the bobcats were in the treetops we could get
up very close. They looked like large malevolent pussies.
I once heard one of them squall defiance when the dogs
tried to get it out of a hole. Ordinarily they confined
themselves to a low growling. Stewart and Goff went up
the trees with their cameras whenever we got a bobcat
in a favorable position, and endeavored to take its photo-
graph. Sometimes they were very successful. Although
1 6 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
they were frequently within six feet of a cat, and occa-
sionally even poked it in order to make it change its posi-
tion, I never saw one make a motion to jump on them.
Two or three times on our approach the cat jumped from
the tree almost into the midst of the pack, but it was
so quick that it got ofif before they could seize it. They
invariably put it up another tree before it had gone any
distance.
Hunting the bobcat was only an incident. Our true
quarry was the cougar. I had long been anxious to make
a regular hunt after cougar in a country where the beasts
were plentiful and where we could follow them with
a good pack of hounds. Astonishingly little of a satis-
factory nature has been left on record about the cougar
by hunters, and in most places the chances for observa-
tion of the big cats steadily grow less. They have been
thinned out almost to the point of extermination through-
out the Eastern States. In the Rocky Mountain region
they are still plentiful in places, but are growing less
so; while on the contrary the wolf, which was extermi-
nated even more quickly in the East, in the West has
until recently been increasing in numbers. In north-
western Colorado a dozen years ago, CQUgars were far
more plentiful than wolves; whereas at the present day
the wolf is probably the more numerous. Nevertheless,
there are large areas, here and there among the Rockies,
in which cougars will be fairly plentiful for years to
come.
No American beast has been the subject of so much
loose writing or of such wild fables as the cougar. Even
BOBCAT IN PINYON
From a photograph by Philip B. Stewart
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 17
its name is unsettled. In the Eastern States it is usually
called panther or painter; in the Western States, moun-
tain lion, or, toward the South, Mexican lion. The Span-
ish-speaking people usually call it simply lion. It is,
however, sometimes called cougar in the West and South-
west of our country, and in South America, puma. As
it is desirable where possible not to use a name that is
misleading and is already appropriated to some entirely
different animal, it is best to call it cougar.
The cougar is a very singular beast, shy and elusive
to an extraordinary degree, very cowardly and yet blood-
thirsty and ferocious, varying wonderfully in size, and
subject, like many other beasts, to queer freaks of char-
acter in occasional individuals. This fact of individual
variation in size and temper is almost always ignored
in treating of the animal; whereas it ought never to be
left out of sight.
The average writer, and for the matter of that, the
average hunter, where cougars are scarce, knows little
or nothing of them, and in describing them merely draws
upon the stock of well-worn myths which portray them
as terrible foes of man, as dropping on their prey from
trees where they have been lying in wait, etc., etc. Very
occasionally there appears an absolutely trustworthy ac-
count like that by Dr. Hart Merriam in his "Adirondack
Mammals." But many otherwise excellent writers are
wholly at sea in reference to the cougar. Thus one of
the best books on hunting in the far West in the old days
is by Colonel Dodge. Yet when Colonel Dodge came to
describe the cougar he actually treated of it as two species,
1 8 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
one of which, the mountain lion, he painted as a most
ferocious and dangerous opponent of man; while the
other, the panther, was described as an abject coward,
which would not even in the last resort defend itself
against man — the two of course being the same animal.
However, the wildest of all fables about the cougar
has been reserved not for hunter or popular writer, but
for a professed naturalist. In his charmingly written
book, " The Naturalist in La Plata," Mr. Hudson act-
ually describes the cougar as being friendly to man, dis-
interestedly adverse to harming him, and at the same
time an enemy of other large carnivores. Mr. Hudson
bases his opinion chiefly upon the assertions of the
Gauchos. The Gauchos, however, go one degree beyond
Mr. Hudson, calling the puma the '' friend of Chris-
tians"; whereas Mr. Hudson only ventures to attribute
to the beast humanitarian, not theological, preferences.
As a matter of fact, Mr. Hudson's belief in the cougar's
peculiar friendship for man, and peculiar enmity to other
large beasts of prey, has not one particle of foundation
in fact as regards at any rate the North American form —
and it is hardly to be supposed that the South American
form would alone develop such extraordinary traits. For
instance, Mr. Hudson says that the South American
puma when hunted will attack the dogs in preference to
the man. In North America he will fight the dog if
the dog is nearest, and if the man comes to close quarters
at the same time as the dog he will attack the man if
anything more readily, evidently recognizing in him his
chief opponent. He will often go up a tree for a single
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 19
dog. On Mr. Hudson's theory he must do this because
of his altruistic feeling toward the dog. In fact, Mr.
Hudson could make out a better case of philo-humanity
for the North American wolf than for the North Ameri-
can cougar. Equally absurd is it to talk, as Mr. Hudson
does, of the cougar as the especial enemy of other fero-
cious beasts. Mr. Hudson speaks of it as attacking and
conquering the jaguar. Of this I know nothing, but such
an extraordinary statement should be well fortified with
proofs; and if true it must mean that the jaguar is an
infinitely less formidable creature than it has been
painted. In support of his position Mr. Hudson alludes
to the stories about the cougar attacking the grizzly bear.
Here I am on ground that I do know. It is true that
an occasional old hunter asserts that the cougar does this,
but the old hunter who makes such an assertion also in-
variably insists that the cougar is a ferocious and habitual
man-killer, and the two statements rest upon equally
slender foundations of fact. I have never yet heard of
a single authentic instance of a cougar interfering with
a full-grown big bear. It will kill bear cubs if it gets a
chance; but then so will the fox and the fisher, not to
speak of the wolf. In 1894, ^ cougar killed a colt on a
brushy river bottom a dozen miles below my ranch on the
Little Missouri. I went down to visit the carcass and
found that it had been taken possession of by a large
grizzly. Both I and the hunter who was with me were
very much interested in what had occurred, and after a
careful examination of the tracks we concluded that the
bear had arrived on the second night after the kill. He
20 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
had feasted heartily on the remains, while the cougar,
whose tracks were evident here and there at a little dis-
tance from the carcass, had seemingly circled around it,
and had certainly not interfered with the bear, or even
ventured to approach him. Now, if a cougar would ever
have meddled with a large bear it would surely have
been on such an occasion as this. If very much pressed
by hunger, a large cougar will, if it gets the chance, kill
a wolf; but this is only when other game has failed, and
under all ordinary circumstances neither meddles with
the other. When I was down in Texas, hunting peccaries
on the Nueces, I was in a country where both cougar and
jaguar were to be found; but no hunter had ever heard
of either molesting the other, though they were all of
the opinion that when the two met the cougar gave the
path to his spotted brother. Of course, it is never safe
to dogmatize about the unknown in zoology, or to gen-
eralize on insufficient evidence; but as regards the North
American cougar there is not a particle of truth of any
kind, sort, or description in the statement that he is the
enemy of the larger carnivores, or the friend of man;
and if the South American cougar, which so strongly
resembles its Northern brother in its other habits, has de-
veloped on these two points the extraordinary peculiar-
ities of which Mr. Hudson speaks, full and adequate
proof should be forthcoming; and this proof is now
wholly wanting.
Fables aside, the cougar is a very interesting creature.
It is found from the cold, desolate plains of Patagonia
to north of the Canadian line, and lives alike among the
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 21
snow-clad peaks of the Andes and in the steaming forests
of the Amazon. Doubtless careful investigation will dis-
close several varying forms in an animal found over such
immense tracts of country and living under such utterly
diverse conditions. But in its essential habits and traits,
the big, slinking, nearly uni-colored cat seems to be much
the same everywhere, whether living in mountain, open
plain, or forest, under arctic cold or tropic heat. When
the settlements become thick, it retires to dense forest,
dark swamp or inaccessible mountain gorge, and moves
about only at night. In wilder regions it not infrequent-
ly roams during the day and ventures freely into the
open. Deer are its customary prey where they are
plentiful, bucks, does, and fawns being killed indififer-
ently. Usually the deer is killed almost instantaneously,
but occasionally there is quite a scuffle, in which the cou-
gar may get bruised, though, as far as I know, never
seriously. It is also a dreaded enemy of sheep, pigs,
calves, and especially colts, and when pressed by hun-
ger a big male cougar will kill a full-grown horse or
cow, moose or wapiti. It is the special enemy of moun-
tain sheep. In 1886, while hunting white goats north
of Clarke's fork of the Columbia, in a region where cou-
gar were common, I found them preying as freely on
the goats as on the deer. It rarely catches antelope, but
is quick to seize rabbits, other small beasts, and even por-
cupines, as well as bobcats, coyotes and foxes.
No animal, not even the wolf, is so rarely seen or so
difflcult to get without dogs. On the other hand, no other
wild beast of its size and power is so easy to kill by the aid
22 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
of dogs. There are many contradictions in its character.
Like the American wolf, it is certainly very much afraid
of man; yet it habitually follows the trail of the hunter or
solitary traveller, dogging his footsteps, itself always un-
seen. I have had this happen to me personally. When
hungry it will seize and carry off any dog; yet it will
sometimes go up a tree when pursued even by a single
small dog wholly unable to do it the least harm. It is
small wonder that the average frontier settler should
grow to regard almost with superstition the great furtive
cat which he never sees, but of whose presence he is ever
aware, and of whose prowess sinister proof is sometimes
afforded by the deaths not alone of his lesser stock, but
even of his milch cow or saddle horse.
The cougar is as large, as powerful, and as formidably
armed as the Indian panther, and quite as well able to
attack man; yet the instances of its having done so are
exceedingly rare. The vast majority of the tales to this
effect are undoubtedly inventions. But it is foolish to
deny that such attacks on human beings ever occur.
There are a number of authentic instances, the latest that
has come to my knowledge being related in the following
letter, of May 15, 1893, written to Dr. Merriam by Pro-
fessor W. H. Brewer, of Yale: '' In 1880 I visited the
base of Mount Shasta, and stopped a day to renew the
memories of 1862, when I had climbed and measured this
mountain. Panthers were numerous and were so destruc-
tive to sheep that poisoning by strychnine was common.
A man living near who had (as a young hunter) gone up
Mount Shasta with us in '62, now married (1880) and
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 23
on a ranch, came to visit me, with a little son five or six
years old. This boy when younger, but two or three years
old, if I recollect rightly, had been attacked by a pan-
ther. He was playing in the yard by the house when
a lean two-thirds grown panther came into the yard and
seized the child by the throat. The child screamed, and
alarmed the mother (who told me the story) . She seized
a broom and rushed out, while an old man at the house
seized the gun. The panther let go the child and was
shot. I saw the boy. He had the scars of the panther's
teeth in the cheek, and below on the under side of the
lower jaw, and just at the throat. This was the only case
that came to my knowledge at first hand of a panther at-
tacking a human being in that State, except one or two
cases where panthers, exasperated by wounds, had fought
with the hunters who had wounded them." This was a
young cougar, bold, stupid, and very hungry. Gofif told
me of one similar case where a cougar stalked a young
girl, but was shot just before it was close enough to make
the final rush. As I have elsewhere related, I know of
two undoubted cases, one in Mississippi, one in Florida,
where a negro was attacked and killed by a cougar, while
alone in a swamp at night. But these occurred many
years ago. The instance related by Professor Brewer is
the only one I have come across happening in recent
years, in which the cougar actually seized a human being
with the purpose of making prey of it; though doubtless
others have occurred. I have never known the American
wolf actually to attack a human being from hunger or
to make prey of him; whereas the Old- World wolf, like
24
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the Old-World leopard, undoubtedly sometimes turns
man-eater.
Even when hunted the cougar shows itself, as a rule,
an abject coward, not to be compared in courage and
prowess with the grizzly bear, and but little more dan-
gerous to man than is the wolf under similar circum-
stances. Without dogs it is usually a mere chance that
one is killed. Goff has killed some 300 cougars during
the sixteen years he has been hunting in northwestern
Colorado, yet all but two of them were encountered while
he was with his pack; although this is in a region where
they were plentiful. When hunted with good dogs their
attention is so taken up with the pack that they have
little time to devote to men. When hunted without dogs
they never charge unless actually cornered, and, as a gen-
eral rule, not even then, unless the man chooses to come
right up to them. I knew of one Indian being killed
in 1887, and near my ranch a cowboy was mauled; but
in the first instance the cougar had been knocked down
and the Indian was bending over it when it revived;
and in the next instance, the cowboy literally came right
on top of the animal. Now, under such circumstances
either a bull elk or a blacktail buck will occasionally
fight; twice I have known of wounded wapiti regularly
charging, and one of my own cowboys, George Myer,
was very roughly handled by a blacktail buck which he
had wounded. In all his experience Goff says that save
when he approached one too close when it was cornered
by the dogs, he never but once had a cougar start to
charge him, and on that occasion it was promptly killed
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 25
by a bullet. Usually the cougar does not even charge
at the dogs beyond a few feet, confining itself to seizing
or striking any member of the pack which comes close
up; although it will occasionally, when much irritated,
make a rapid dash and seize some bold assailant. While
I was on my hunt, one of Goff's brothers lost a hound in
hunting a cougar; there were but two hounds, and the
cougar would not tree for them, finally seizing and kill-
ing one that came too near. At the same time a ranchman
not far off set his cattle dog on a cougar, which after a
short run turned and killed the dog. But time and again
cougars are brought to bay or treed by dogs powerless
to do them the slightest damage; and they usually meet
their death tamely when the hunter comes up. I have
had no personal experience either with the South Ameri-
can jaguar or the Old-World leopard or panther; but
these great spotted cats must be far more dangerous ad-
versaries than the cougar.
It is true, as I have said, that a cougar will follow
a man; but then a weasel will sometimes do the same
thing. Whatever the cougar's motive, it is certain that
in the immense majority of cases there is not the slightest
danger of his attacking the man he follows. Dr. Hart
Merriam informs me, however, that he is satisfied that
he came across one genuine instance of a cougar killing
a man whose tracks he had dogged. It cannot be too
often repeated, that we must never lose sight of the indi-
vidual variation in character and conduct among wild
beasts. A thousand times a cougar might follow a man
either not intending or not daring to attack him, while
26 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
in the thousandth and first case it might be that the tem-
per of the beast and the conditions were such that the
attack would be made.
Other beasts show almost the same wide variation in
temper. Wolves, for instance, are normally exceedingly
wary of man. In this Colorado hunt I often came across
their tracks, and often heard their mournful, but to my
ears rather attractive, baying at night, but I never caught
a glimpse of one of them; nor during the years when I
spent much of my time on my ranch did I ever know of
a wolf venturing to approach anywhere near a man in
the day-time, though I have had them accompany me
after nightfall, and have occasionally come across them by
accident in daylight. But on the Keystone Ranch, where
I spent three weeks on this particular trip, an incident
which occurred before my arrival showed that wolves oc-
casionally act with extraordinary boldness. The former
owner of the ranch. Colonel Price, and one of the cow-
hands, Sabey (both of whom told me the story), were
driving out in a buggy from Meeker to the ranch accom-
panied by a setter dog. They had no weapon with them.
Two wolves joined them and made every effort to get
at the dog. They accompanied the wagon for nearly a
mile, venturing to within twenty yards of it. They paid
no heed whatever to the shouts and gestures of the men,
but did not quite dare to come to close quarters, and
finally abandoned their effort. Now, this action on their
part was, as far as my experience goes, quite as excep-
tional among American wolves as it is exceptional for
a cougar to attack a man. Of course, these wolves were
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 27
not after the men. They were simply after the dog; but
I have never within my own experience come upon an-
other instance of wolves venturing to attack a domestic
animal in the immediate presence of and protected by a
man. Exactly as these two wolves suddenly chose to
behave with an absolutely unexpected daring, so a cougar
will occasionally lose the fear of man which is inherent
in its race.
Normally, then, the cougar is not in any way a for-
midable foe to man, and it is certainly by no means as
dangerous to dogs as it could be if its courage and in-
telligence equalled its power to do mischief. It strikes
with its forepaw like a cat, lacerating the foe with its
sharp claws; or else it holds the animal with them, while
the muscular forearm draws it in until the fatal bite may
be inflicted. Whenever possible it strives to bite an as-
sailant in the head. Occasionally, when fighting with a
large dog, a cougar will throw itself on its back and try
to rip open its antagonist with its hind feet. Male cou-
gars often fight desperately among themselves.
Although a silent beast, yet at times, especially during
the breeding season, the males utter a wild scream, and
the females also wail or call. I once heard one cry re-
peatedly after nightfall, seemingly while prowling for
game. On an evening in the summer of 1897 Dr. Mer-
riam had a rather singular experience with a cougar.
His party was camped in the forest by Tannum Lake,
on the east slope of the Cascades, near the headwaters
of a branch of the Yakima. The horses were feeding
near by. Shortly after dark a cougar cried loudly in
28 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the gloom, and the frightened horses whinnied and
stampeded. The cougar cried a number of times after-
ward, but the horses did not again answer. None of
them was killed, however; and next morning, after some
labor, all were again gathered together. In 1884 I had
a somewhat similar experience with a bear, in the Big
Horn Mountains.
Occasionally, but not often, the cougars I shot snarled
or uttered a low, thunderous growl as we approached the
tree, or as the dogs came upon them in the cave. In the
death-grapple they were silent, excepting that one young
cougar snarled and squalled as it battled with the dogs.
The cougar is sometimes tamed. A friend of mine
had one which was as good-natured as possible until it
was a year old, when it died. But one kept by another
friend, while still quite young, became treacherous and
dangerous. I doubt if they would ever become as trust-
worthy as a tame wolf, which, if taken when a very young
puppy, will often grow up exactly like a dog. Two or
three years ago there was such a tame wolf with the Colo-
rado Springs greyhounds. It was safer and more friendly
than many collies, and kept on excellent terms with the
great greyhounds; though these were themselves solely
used to hunt wolves and coyotes, and tackled them with
headlong ferocity, having, unaided, killed a score or two
of the large wolves and hundreds of coyotes.
Hunting in the snow we were able to tell very clearly
what the cougars whose trails we were following had
been doing. Gofif's eye for a trail was unerring, and he
read at a glance the lesson it taught. All the cougars
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 29
which we came across were living exclusively upon deer,
and their stomachs were filled with nothing else; much
hair being mixed with the meat. In each case the deer
was caught by stalking and not by lying in wait, and
the cougar never went up a tree except to get rid of the
dogs. In the day-time it retired to a ledge, or ravine, or
dense thicket, starting to prowl as the dark came on. So
far as I could see the deer in each case was killed by a
bite in the throat or neck. The cougar simply rambled
around in likely grounds until it saw or smelled its
quarry, and then crept up stealthily until with one or
two tremendous bounds it was able to seize its prey.
If, as frequently happened, the deer took alarm in
time to avoid the first few bounds, it always got away,
for though the cougar is very fast for a short distance,
it has no wind whatever. It cannot pursue a deer for
any length of time, nor run before a dog for more than
a few hundred yards, if the dog is close up at the start.
I was informed by the ranchmen that when in May the
deer leave the country, the cougars turn their attention
to the stock, and are very destructive. They have a special
fondness for horseflesh and kill almost every colt where
they are plentiful, while the big males work havoc with
the saddle bands on the ranches, as well as among the
brood mares. Except in the case of a female with young
they are roving, wandering beasts, and roam great dis-
tances. After leaving their day lairs, on a ledge, or in
a gorge or thicket, they spend the night travelling across
the flats, along the ridges, over the spurs. When they
kill a deer they usually lie not very far away, and do
30 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
not again wander until they are hungry. The males
travel very long distances in the mating season. Their
breeding-time is evidently irregular. We found kittens
with their eyes not yet open in the middle of January.
Two of the female cougars we killed were pregnant —
in one case the young would have been born almost im-
mediately, that is, in February; and in the other case in
March. One, which had a partially grown young one
of over fifty pounds with it, still had milk in its teats.
At the end of January we found a male and female to-
gether, evidently mating. Gofif has also found the young
just dropped in May, and even in June. The females
outnumber the males. Of the fourteen we killed, but
three were males.
When a cougar kills a deer in the open it invariably
drags it under some tree or shelter before beginning to
eat. All the carcasses we came across had been thus
dragged, the trail showing distinctly in the snow. Gofif,
however, asserted that in occasional instances he had
known a cougar to carry a deer so that only its legs trailed
on the ground.
The fourteen cougars we killed showed the widest
variation not only in size but in color, as shown by the
following table. Some were as slaty-gray as deer when
in the so-called " blue "; others, rufous, almost as bright
as deer in the " red." I use these two terms to describe
the color phases; though in some instances the tint was
very undecided. The color phase evidently has nothing
to do with age, sex, season, or locality. In this table the
first cougar is the one killed by Stewart, the sixth by
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS
31
Webb. The length is measured in a straight line, " be-
tween uprights," from the nose to the extreme tip of the
tail, when the beast was stretched out. The animals were
weighed with the steelyard and also spring scales. Be-
fore measuring, we pulled the beast out as straight as we
possibly could; and as the biggest male represents about,
or very nearly, the maximum for the species, it is easy
Sex.
Color.
Length.
Weight.
Date.
Feet.
Inches.
Pounds.
1 90 1.
^Female.
Blue.
4
II
47
January 19
^Female.
Red.
4
II>^
51
February 12
Female.
Blue.
6
80
January 14
Female.
Red.
6
4
102
January 28
Female.
Blue.
6
5
105
February 12
Female.
Blue.
6
5
107
January 18
Female.
Red.
6
9
108
January 24
Female.
Blue.
6
7
118
January 15
Female.
Blue.
6
7
120
January 31
Female.
Red.
6
9 •
124
February 5
Female.
Blue.
7
133
February 8
Male.
Red.
7
6
160
February 13
Male.
Blue.
7
8
164
January 27
Male.
Red.
8
227
February 14
to see that there can be no basis for the talk one sometimes
hears about ten and eleven foot cougars. No cougar,
measured at all fairly, has ever come anywhere near
reaching the length of nine feet. The fresh hide can
easily be stretched a couple of feet extra. Except the first
two, all were full grown; the biggest male was nearly
three times the size of the smallest female.
I shot five bobcats : two old males weighing 39 and 31
1 Young.
32 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
pounds respectively; and three females, weighing, respec-
tively, 25, 21, and 18 pounds. Webb killed two, a male
of 29 pounds and a female of 20; and Stewart two females,
one of 22 pounds, and the other a young one of 1 1 pounds.
I sent the cougar and bobcat skulls to Dr. Merriam,
at the Biological Survey, Department of Agriculture,
Washington. He wrote me as follows: " The big [cou-
gar] skull is certainly a giant. I have compared it with
the largest in our collection from British Columbia and
Wyoming, and find it larger than either. It is in fact
the largest skull of any member of the Felis concolor
group I have seen. A hasty preliminary examination in-
dicates that the animal is quite different from the north-
west coast form, but that it is the same as my horse-killer
from Wyoming — Felis hippolestes. In typical Felis con-
color from Brazil the skull is lighter, the brain-case thin-
ner and more smoothly rounded, devoid of the strongly
developed sagittal crest; the under jaw straighter and
lighter.
" Your series of skulls from Colorado is incomparably
the largest, most complete and most valuable series ever
brought together from any single locality, and will be of
inestimable value in determining the amount of indi-
vidual variation."
We rode in to the Keystone Ranch late on the even-
ing of the second day after leaving Meeker. We had
picked up a couple of bobcats on the way, and had found
a cougar's kill (or bait, as Goflf called it) — a doe, almost
completely eaten. The dogs puzzled for several hours
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS
33
over the cold trail of the cougar; but it was old, and ran
hither and thither over bare ground, so that they finally
lost it. The ranch was delightfully situated at the foot
of high wooded hills broken by cliffs, and it was pleasant
to reach the warm, comfortable log buildings, with their
clean rooms, and to revel in the abundant, smoking-hot
dinner, after the long, cold hours in the saddle. As every-
where else in the cattle country nowadays, a successful
effort had been made to store water on the Keystone, and
there were great stretches of wire fencing — two improve-
ments entirely unknown in former days. But the fore-
man, William Wilson, and the two punchers or cow-
hands, Sabey and Collins, were of the old familiar type —
skilled, fearless, hardy, hard-working, with all the in-
telligence and self-respect that we like to claim as typical
of the American character at its best. All three carried
short saddle guns when they went abroad, and killed a
good many coyotes, and now and then a gray wolf. The
cattle were for the most part grade Herefords, very dif-
ferent from the wild, slab-sided, long-horned creatures
which covered the cattle country a score of years ago.
The next day, January 14th, we got our first cougar.
This kind of hunting was totally different from that to
which I had been accustomed. In the first place, there
was no need of always being on the alert for a shot, as
it was the dogs who did the work. In the next place,
instead of continually scanning the landscape, what we
had to do was to look down so as to be sure not to pass
over any tracks; for frequently a cold trail would be in-
dicated so faintly that the dogs themselves might pass it
34 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
by, if unassisted by Goff's keen eyes and thorough knowl-
edge of the habits of the quarry. Finally, there was no
object in making an early start, as what we expected to
find was not the cougar, but the cougar's trail; moreover,
the horses and dogs, tough though they were, could not
stand more than a certain amount, and to ride from sun-
rise to sunset, day in and day out, for five weeks, just
about tested the limits of their endurance.
We made our way slowly up the snow-covered, pin-
yon-clad side of the mountain back of the house, and
found a very old cougar trail which it was useless to try
to run, and a couple of fresh bobcat trails which it was
difficult to prevent the dogs from following. After criss-
crossing over the shoulders of this mountain for two or
three hours, and scrambling in and out of the ravines,
we finally struck another cougar trail, much more recent,
probably made thirty-six hours before. The hounds had
been hunting free to one side or the other of our path.
They were now summoned by a blast of the horn, and
with a wave of Goff's hand away they went on the trail.
Had it been fresh they would have run out of hearing
at once, for it was fearfully rough country. But they were
able to work but slowly along the loops and zigzags of
the trail, where it led across bare spaces, and wc could
keep well in sight and hearing of them. Finally they
came to where it descended the sheer side of the mountain
and crossed the snow-covered valley beneath. They were
still all together, the pace having been so slow, and in
the snow of the valley the scent was fresh. It was a fine
sight to see them as they rushed across from one side to
J
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 35
the other, the cliffs echoing their chiming. Jim and the
three bitches were in the lead, while Boxer fell behind,
as he always did when the pace was fast.
Leading our horses, we slid and scrambled after the
hounds ; but when we reached the valley they had passed
out of sight and sound, and we did not hear them again
until we had toiled up the mountain opposite. They were
then evidently scattered, having come upon many bare
places; but while we were listening, and working our
way over to the other side of the divide, the sudden in-
crease in the baying told Goff that they had struck the
fresh trail of the beast they were after; and in two or
three minutes we heard Jim's deep voice " barking treed."
The three fighters, who had been trotting at our heels,
recognized the difference in the sound quite as quickly
as we did, and plunged at full speed toward it down the
steep hillside, throwing up the snow like so many snow-
ploughs. In a minute or two the chorus told us that all
the dogs were around the tree, and we picked our way
down toward them.
While we were still some distance off we could see
the cougar in a low pinyon moving about as the dogs
tried to get up, and finally knocking one clean out of the
top. It was the first time I had ever seen dogs with a
cougar, and I was immensely interested; but Stewart's
whole concern was with his camera. When we were
within fifty yards of the tree, and I was preparing to
take the rifle out of the scabbard, Stewart suddenly called
" halt," with the first symptoms of excitement he had
shown, and added, in an eager undertone : " Wait, there
36 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
is a rabbit right here, and I want to take his picture."
Accordingly we waited, the cougar not fifty yards off and
the dogs yelling and trying to get up the tree after it,
while Stewart crept up to the rabbit and got a kodak some
six feet distant. Then we resumed our march toward the
tree, and the cougar, not liking the sight of the reinforce-
ments, jumped out. She came down just outside the pack
and ran up hill. So quick was she that the dogs failed
to seize her, and for the first fifty yards she went a great
deal faster than they did. Both in the jump and in the
run she held her tail straight out behind her; I found
out afterward that sometimes one will throw its tail
straight in the air, and when walking along, when first
roused by the pack, before they are close, will, if angry,
lash the tail from side to side, at the same time grinning
and snarling.
In a minute the cougar went up another tree, but,
as we approached, again jumped down, and on this oc-
casion, after running a couple of hundred yards, the dogs
seized it. The worry was terrific; the growling, snarling,
and yelling rang among the rocks; and leaving our horses
we plunged at full speed through the snow down the
rugged ravine in which the fight was going on. It was
a small though old female, only a few pounds heavier
than either Turk or Jim, and the dogs had the upper
hand when we arrived. They would certainly have
killed it unassisted, but as it was doing some damage to
the pack, and might at any moment kill a dog, I ended
the struggle by a knife-thrust behind the shoulder. To
shoot would have been quite as dangerous for the dogs
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS
37
as for their quarry. Three of the dogs were badly
scratched, and Turk had been bitten through one foreleg,
and Boxer through one hind leg.
As will be seen by the measurements given before,
this was much the smallest full-grown cougar we got. It
was also one of the oldest, as its teeth showed, and it
gave me a false idea of the size of cougars; although I
knew they varied in size I was not prepared for the wide
variation we actually found.
The fighting dogs were the ones that enabled me to
use the knife. All three went straight for the head, and
when they got hold they kept their jaws shut, worrying
and pulling, and completely absorbing the attention of
the cougar, so as to give an easy chance for the death-
blow. The hounds meanwhile had seized the cougar be-
hind, and Jim, with his alligator jaws, probably did as
much damage as Turk. However, neither in this nor in
any other instance, did any one of the dogs manage to get
its teeth through the thick skin. When cougars fight
among themselves their claws and fangs leave great scars,
but their hides are too thick for the dogs to get their
teeth through. On the other hand, a cougar's jaws have
great power, and dogs are frequently killed by a single
bite, the fangs being driven through the brain or spine;
or they break a dog's leg or cut the big blood-vessels of
the throat.
I had been anxious to get a set of measurements and
weights of cougars to give to Dr. Hart Merriam. Ac-
cordingly I was carrying a tape, while Goff, instead of
a rifle, had a steelyard in his gun scabbard. We weighed
38 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
and measured the cougar, and then took lunch, making
as impartial a distribution of it as was possible among
ourselves and the different members of the pack; for, of
course, we were already growing to have a hearty fellow-
feeling for each individual dog.
The next day we were again in luck. After about two <
hours' ride we came upon an old trail. It led among
low hills, covered with pinyon and cedar, and broken by
gullies or washouts, in whose sharp sides of clay the water
had made holes and caves. Soon the hounds left it to
follow a bobcat, and we had a lively gallop through the
timber, dodging the sharp snags of the dead branches
as best we might. The cat got into a hole in a side
washout; Baldy went in after it, and the rest of us, men
and dogs, clustered about to look in. After a consider-
able time he put the cat out of the other end of the hole,
nearly a hundred yards off, close to the main washout.
The first we knew of it we saw it coming straight toward
us, its tail held erect like that of a whitetail deer. Be-
fore either we or the dogs quite grasped the situation it
bolted into another hole almost at our feet, and this time
Baldy could not find it, or else could not get at it. Then
we took up the cougar trail again. It criss-crossed in
every direction. We finally found an old " bait," a buck.
It was interesting to see the way in which the cougar had
prowled from point to point, and the efforts it had made
to approach the deer which it saw or smelled. Once
we came to where it had sat down on the edge of a
cliff, sitting on its haunches with its long tail straight
behind it and looking out across the valley. After it had
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 39
killed, according to the invariable custom of its kind, it
had dragged the deer from the open, where it had over-
taken it, to the shelter of a group of trees.
We finally struck the fresh trail; but it, also, led
hither and thither, and we got into such a maze of tracks
that the dogs were completely puzzled. After a couple
of hours of vain travelling to and fro, we gave up the
efifort, called the dogs ofif, and started back beside a large
washout which led along between two ridges. Goff, as
usual, was leading, the dogs following and continually
skirting to one side or the other. Suddenly they all began
to show great excitement, and then one gave furious
tongue at the mouth of a hole in some sunken and broken
ground not thirty yards to our right. The whole pack
rushed toward the challenge, the fighters leaped into the
hole, and in another moment the row inside told us that
they had found a cougar at home. We jumped ofif and
ran down to see if we could be of assistance. To get into
the hole was impossible, for two or three hounds had
jumped down to join the fighters, and we could see noth-
ing but their sterns. Then we saw Turk backing out with
a dead kitten in his mouth. I had supposed that a cougar
would defend her young to the last, but such was not the
case in this instance. For some minutes she kept the dogs
at bay, but then gradually gave ground, leaving her three
kittens. Of course, the dogs killed them instantly, much
to our regret, as we would have given a good deal to
have kept them alive. As soon as she had abandoned
them, away she went completely through the low cave
or hole, leaped out of the other end, which was some
40 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
thirty or forty yards off, scaled the bank, and galloped
into the woods, the pack getting after her at once. She
did not run more than a couple of hundred yards, and
as we tore up on our horses we saw her standing in the
lower branches of a pinyon only six or eight feet from
the ground. She was not snarling or grinning, and
looked at us as quietly as if nothing had happened. As
we leaped out of the saddles she jumped down from the
tree and ran off through the pack. They were after her
at once, however, and a few yards farther on she started
up another tree. Either Tony or Baldy grabbed her by
the tip of the tail, she lost her footing for a moment,
and the whole pack seized her. She was a powerful fe-
male of about the average size, being half as heavy again
as the one we first got, and made a tremendous fight; and
savage enough she looked, her ears tight back against
her head, her yellow eyes flashing, and her great teeth
showing as she grinned. For a moment the dogs had her
down, but biting and striking she freed her head and
fore quarters from the fighters, and faced us as we ran
up, the hounds still having her from behind. This was
another chance for the knife, and I cheered on the
fighters. Again they seized her by the head, but though
absolutely stanch dogs, their teeth, as I have said, had
begun to suffer, and they were no longer always able to
make their holds good. Just as I was about to strike
her she knocked Turk loose with a blow, bit Baldy, and
then, her head being free, turned upon me. Fortunately,
Tony caught her free paw on that side, while I jammed
the gun-butt into her jaws with my left hand and struck
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 41
home with the right, the knife driving straight to the
heart. The deep fang marks she left in the stock, biting
the corner of the shoulder clean of]f, gave an idea of the
power of her jaws. If it had been the very big male
cougar which I afterward killed, the stock would doubt-
less have been bitten completely in two.
The dogs were pretty well damaged, and all retired
and lay down under the trees, where they licked their
wounds, and went to sleep ; growling savagely at one an-
other when they waked, but greeting us with demonstra-
tive affection, and trotting eagerly out to share our lunch
as soon as we began to eat it. Unaided, they would ulti-
mately have killed the cougar, but the chance of one or
two of them being killed or crippled was too great for
us to allow this to be done; and in the mix-up of the
struggle it was not possible to end it with the rifle. The
writhing, yelling tangle offered too shifting a mark; one
would have been as apt to hit a dog as the cougar. Gofif
told me that the pack had often killed cougars unassisted;
but in the performance of such feats the best dogs were
frequently killed, and this was not a risk to be taken
lightly.
In some books the writers speak as if the male and
female cougar live together and jointly seek food for the
young. We never found a male cougar anywhere near
either a female with young or a pregnant female. Ac-
cording to my observation the male only remains with
the female for a short time, during the mating season, at
which period he travels great distances in search of his
temporary mates — for the females far outnumber the
42 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
males. The cougar is normally a very solitary beast.
The young — two to four in number, though more than
one or two rarely grow up — follow the mother until over
half grown. The mother lives entirely alone with the
kittens while they are small. As the males fight so
fiercely among themselves, it may be that the old he-cou-
gars kill the young of their own sex; a ranchman whom
I knew once found the body of a young male cougar
which had evidently been killed by an old one; but I
cannot say whether or not this was an exceptional case.
During the next ten days Stewart and Webb each shot
a cougar. Webb's was got by as pretty an exhibition of
trailing on the part of Gof¥ and his hounds as one could
wish to see. We ran across its old tracks while coming
home on Wednesday, January i6th. The next day,
Thursday, we took up the trail, but the animal had trav-
elled a long distance; and, as cougars so often do, had
spent much of its time walking along ledges, or at the
foot of the clififs, where the sun had melted the snow off
the ground. In consequence, the dogs were often at fault.
Moreover, bobcats were numerous, and twice the pack
got after one, running a couple of hours before, in one
instance, the cat went into a cave, and, in the other, took
to a tree, where it was killed by Webb. At last, when
darkness came on, we were forced to leave the cougar
trail and ride home; a very attractive ride, too, loping
rapidly over the snow-covered flats, while above us the
great stars fairly blazed in the splendor of the winter
night.
Early next morning we again took up the trail, and
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 43
after a little while found where it was less than thirty-six
hours old. The dogs now ran it well, but were thrown
out again on a large bare hillside, until Boxer succeeded
in recovering the scent. They went up a high mountain
and we toiled after them. Again they lost the trail, and
while at fault jumped a big bobcat which they ran up
a tree. After shooting him we took lunch, and started
to circle for the trail. Most of the dogs kept with Gofif,
but Jim got ofif to one side on his own account; and sud-
denly his baying told us that he had jumped the cougar.
The rest of the pack tore toward him and after a quarter
of a mile run they had the quarry treed. The ground
was too rough for riding, and we had to do some stiff
climbing to get to it on foot.
Stewart's cougar was a young-of-the-year, and, ac-
cording to his custom, he took several photographs of it.
Then he tried to poke it so that it would get into a better
position for the camera; whereupon it jumped out of the
tree and ran headlong down hill, the yelling dogs but a
few feet behind. Our horses had been left a hundred
yards or so below, where they all stood, moping, with
their heads drooped and their eyes half shut, in regular
cow-pony style. The chase streamed by not a yard from
their noses, but evidently failed to arouse even an emotion
of interest in their minds, for they barely looked up, and
made not a movement of any kind when the cougar treed
again just below them.
We killed several bobcats; and we also got another
cougar, this time in rather ignominious fashion. We
had been running a bobcat, having an excellent gallop,
44 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
during the course of which Stewart's horse turned a
somersault. Without our knowledge the dogs changed
to the fresh trail of a cougar, which they ran into its den
in another cut bank. When we reached the place they
had gone in after it, Baldy dropping into a hole at the
top of the bank, while the others crawled into the main
entrance, some twenty-five yards off at the bottom. It
was evidently a very rough house inside, and above the
baying, yelping, and snarling of the dogs we could hear
the rumbling overtone of the cougar's growl. On this
day we had taken along Queen, the white bull bitch, to
*' enter " her at cougar. It was certainly a lively ex-
perience for a first entry. We reached the place in time
to keep Jim and the hound bitches out of the hole. It
was evident that the dogs could do nothing with the cou-
gar inside. They could only come at it in front, and
under such circumstances its claws and teeth made the
odds against them hopeless. Every now and then it
would charge, driving them all back, and we would then
reach in, seize a dog and haul him out. At intervals there
would be an awful yelling and a hound would come out
bleeding badly, quite satisfied, and without the slightest
desire to go in again. Poor Baldy was evidently killed
inside. Queen, Turk, and Tony were badly clawed and
bitten, and we finally got them out too; Queen went in
three times, and came out on each occasion with a fresh
gash or bite; Turk was, at the last, the only one really
anxious to go in again. Then we tried to smoke out
the cougar, for as one of the dogs had gotten into the
cave through an upper entrance, we supposed the cougar
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 45
could get out by the same route. However, it either
could not or would not bolt; coming down close to the
entrance where we had built the sage-brush fire, there
it stayed until it was smothered. We returned to the
ranch carrying its skin, but not over-pleased, and the
pack much the worse for wear. Dr. Webb had to sew
up the wounds of three of the dogs. One, Tony, was
sent back to the home ranch, where he died. In such
rough hunting as this, it is of course impossible to pre-
vent occasional injuries to the dogs when they get the
cougar in a cave, or overtake him on the ground. All
that can be done is to try to end the contest as speedily
as possible, which we always did.
Judging from the experience of certain friends of
mine in the Argentine, I think it would be safe to crawl
into a cave to shoot a cougar under normal circumstances;
but in this instance the cave was a long, winding hole,
so low that we could not get in on hands and knees, hav-
ing to work our way on our elbows. It was pitch dark
inside, so that the rifle sights could not be seen, and the
cougar was evidently very angry and had on two or three
occasions charged the dogs, driving them out of the en-
trance of the hole. In the dark, the chances were strongly
against killing it with a single shot; while if only
wounded, and if it had happened to charge, the man, in
his cramped position, would have been utterly helpless.
The day after the death of the smoked-out cougar
Stewart and Webb started home. Then it snowed for two
days, keeping us in the ranch. While the snow was fall-
ing, there was no possibility of finding or following
46 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
tracks; and as a rule wild creatures lie close during a
storm. We were glad to have fresh snow, for the multi-
tude of tracks in the old snow had become confusing; and
not only the southern hillsides but the larger valleys had
begun to grow bare, so that trailing was difficult.
The third day dawned in brilliant splendor, and when
the sun arose all the land glittered dazzling white under
his rays. The hounds were rested, we had fresh horses,
and after an early breakfast we started to make a long
circle. All the forenoon and early afternoon we plodded
through the snowdrifts, up and down the valleys, and
along the ridge crests, without striking a trail. The dogs
trotted behind us or circled from one side to the other.
It was no small test of their stanchness, eager and fresh
as they were, for time after time we aroused bands of
deer, to which they paid no heed whatever. At last, in
mid-afternoon, we suddenly struck the tracks of two
cougars, one a very large one, an old male. They had
been playing and frolicking together, for they were evi-
dently mating, and the snow in the tracks showed that
they had started abroad before the storm was entirely
over. For three hours the pack followed the cold trail,
through an exceedingly rugged and difficult country, in
which Gofi helped them out again and again.
Just at sunset the cougars were jumped, and ran
straight into and through a tangle of spurs and foothills,
broken by precipices, and riven by long deep ravines.
The two at first separated and then came together, with
the result that Tree'em, Bruno, and Jimmie got on the
back trail and so were left far behind; while old Boxer
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 47
also fell to the rear, as he always did when the scent was
hot, and Jim and the bitches were left to do the running
by themselves. In the gathering gloom we galloped
along the main divide, my horse once falling on a slip-
pery sidehill, as I followed headlong after GofI — whose
riding was like the driving of the son of Nimshi. The
last vestige of sunlight disappeared, but the full moon
was well up in the heavens when we came to a long spur,
leading ofl to the right for two or three miles, beyond
which we did not think the chase could have gone. It
had long run out of hearing. Making our way down the
rough and broken crest of this spur, we finally heard
far off the clamorous baying which told us that the
hounds had their quarry at bay. We did not have the
fighters with us, as they were still under the weather from
the results of their encounter in the cave.
As it afterward appeared, the cougars had run three
miles before the dogs overtook them, making their way
up, down and along such difficult cliffs that the pack had
to keep going round. The female then went up a tree,
while the pack followed the male. He would not climb a
tree and came to bay on the edge of a cliff. A couple of
hundred yards from the spot, we left the horses and
scrambled along on foot, guided by the furious clamor
of the pack. When we reached them, the cougar had
gone along the face of the cliff, most of the dogs could
not see him, and it was some time before we could make
him out ourselves. Then I got up quite close. Although
the moonlight was bright I could not see the sights of
my rifle, and fired a little too far back. The bullet, how-
48 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
ever, inflicted a bad wound, and the cougar ran along a
ledge, disappearing around the cliff shoulder. The con-
duct of the dogs showed that he had not left the cliff, but
it was impossible to see him either from the sides or from
below. The cliff was about a hundred feet high and the
top overhung the bottom, while from above the ground
sloped down to the brink at a rather steep angle, so that
we had to be cautious about our footing. There was a
large projecting rock on the brink; to this I clambered
down, and, holding it with one hand, peeped over the
edge. After a minute or two I made out first the tail and
then the head of the cougar, who was lying on a narrow
ledge only some ten feet below me, his body hidden
by the overhang of the cliff. Thanks to the steepness
of the incline, I could not let go of the rock with my
left hand, because I should have rolled over; so I got
Goff to come down, brace his feet against the projection,
and grasp me by my legs. He then lowered me gently
down until my head and shoulders were over the edge
and my arms free; and I shot the cougar right between
the ears, he being in a straight line underneath me. The
dogs were evidently confident that he was going to be
shot, for they had all gathered below the cliff to wait for
him to fall ; and sure enough, down he came with a crash,
luckily not hitting any of them. We could hear them
seize him, and they all, dead cougar and worrying dogs,
rolled at least a hundred yards down the steep slope be-
fore they were stopped by a gully. It was an interest-
ing experience, and one which I shall not soon forget.
We clambered down to where the dogs were, admired
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS
49
our victim, and made up our minds not to try to skin him
until the morning. Then we led down our horses, with
some difficulty, into the snow-covered valley, mounted
them, and cantered home to the ranch, under the cold and
brilliant moon, through a white wonderland of shimmer-
ing light and beauty.
Next morning we came back as early as possible, in-
tending first to skin the male and then to hunt up the
female. A quarter of a mile before we reached the car-
cass we struck her fresh trail in the snow of the valley.
Calling all the dogs together and hustling them for-
ward, we got them across the trail without their paying
any attention to it; for we wanted to finish the job of
skinning before taking up the hunt. However, when we
got ofif our horses and pulled the cougar down to a flat
place to skin it, Nellie, who evidently remembered that
there had been another cougar besides the one we had
accounted for, started away on her own account while
we were not looking. The first thing we knew we heard
her giving tongue on the mountains above us, in such
rough country that there was no use in trying to head her
off. Accordingly we jumped on the horses again, rode
down to where we had crossed the trail and put the
whole pack on it. After crossing the valley the cougar
had moved along the ledges of a great spur or chain of
foothills, and as this prevented the dogs going too fast
we were able to canter alongside them up the valley,
watching them and listening to their chiming. We
finally came to a large hillside bare of snow, much broken
with rocks, among which grew patches of brush and scat-
50 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
tered pinyons. Here the dogs were at fault for over an
hour. It had evidently been a favorite haunt of the cou-
gars; they had moved to and fro across it, and had lain
sunning themselves in the dust under the ledges. Owing
to the character of the ground we could give the hounds
no assistance, but they finally puzzled out the trail for
themselves. We were now given a good illustration of
the impossibility of jumping a cougar without dogs, even
when in a general way its haunt is known. We rode
along the hillside, and quartered it to and fro, on the
last occasion coming down a spur where we passed within
two or three rods of the brush in which the cougar was
actually lying; but she never moved and it was impos-
sible to see her. When we finally reached the bottom,
the dogs had disentangled the trail; and they passed be-
hind us at a good rate, going up almost where we had
come down. Even as we looked we saw the cougar rise
from her lair, only fifty yards or so ahead of them, her
red hide showing bright in the sun. It was a very pretty
run to watch while it lasted. She left them behind at
first, but after a quarter of a mile they put her up a pin-
yon. Approaching cautiously — for the climbing was
hard work and I did not wish to frighten her out of the
tree if it could be avoided, lest she might make such a
run as that of the preceding evening — I was able to shoot
her through the heart. She died in the branches, and
I climbed the tree to throw her down. The only skill
needed in such shooting is in killing the cougar outright
so as to save the dogs. Six times on the hunt I shot the
cougar through the heart. Twice the animal died in
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 51
the branches. In the other four cases it sprang out of
the tree, head and tail erect, eyes blazing, and the mouth
open in a grin of savage hate and anger; but it was prac-
tically dead when it touched the ground.
Although these cougars were mates, they were not of
the same color, the female being reddish, while the male
was slate-colored. In weighing this male we had to
take ofif the hide and weigh it separately (with the head
and paws attached), for our steelyard only went up to
150 pounds. When we came to weigh the biggest male
we had to take off the quarters as well as the hide. •
Thinking that we had probably exhausted the cougars
around the Keystone Ranch, we spent the next fortnight
off on a trip. We carried only what we could put in
the small saddle-pockets — our baggage being as strictly
limited as it ought to be with efficient cavalry who are
on an active campaign. We worked hard, but, as so often
happens, our luck was not in proportion to our labor.
The first day we rode to the Mathes brothers' ranch.
On the high divides it was very cold, the thermometer
standing at nearly twenty degrees below zero. But we
were clad for just such weather, and were not uncom-
fortable. The three Mathes brothers lived together, with
the wives and children of the two married ones. Their
ranch was in a very beautiful and wild valley, the pinyon-
crowned cliffs rising in walls on either hand. Deer were
abundant and often in sight from the ranch doors. At
night the gray wolves came down close to the buildings
and howled for hours among the precipices, under the
light of the full moon. The still cold was intense; but
52
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
I could not resist going out for half an hour at a time
to listen to them. To me their baying, though a very
eerie and lonesome sound, full of vaguely sinister associa-
tions, has, nevertheless, a certain wild music of its own
which is far from being without charm.
We did not hear the cougars calling, for they are cer-
tainly nothing like as noisy as wolves; yet the Mathes
brothers had heard them several times, and once one of
them had crept up and seen the cougar, which remained
in the same place for many minutes, repeating its cry
continually. The Mathes had killed but two cougars,
not having any dogs trained to hunt them. One of these
was killed under circumstances which well illustrate the
queer nature of the animal. The three men, with one of
their two cattle dogs, were walking up the valley not half
a mile above the ranch house, when they saw a cougar
crossing in front of them, a couple of hundred yards off.
As soon as she saw them she crouched flat down with
her head toward them, remaining motionless. Two, with
the dog, stayed where they were, while the other ran
back to the ranch house for a rifle and for the other dog.
No sooner had he gone than the cougar began deliber-
ately to crawl toward the men who were left. She came
on slowly but steadily, crouched almost flat to the ground.
The two unarmed men were by no means pleased with
her approach. They waved their hands and jumped
about and shouted; but she kept approaching, although
slowly, and was well within a hundred yards when the
other brother arrived, out of breath, accompanied by the
other dog. At sight of him she jumped up, ran off a
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 53
couple of hundred yards, went up a tree, and was killed.
I do not suppose she would have attacked the men; but
as there was an unpleasant possibility that she might, they
both felt distinctly more comfortable when their brother
rejoined them with the rifle.
There was a good deal of snowy weather while we
were at the Mathes ranch, but we had fair luck, kill-
ing two cougars. It was most comfortable, for the ranch
was clean and warm, and the cooking delicious. It does
not seem to me that I ever tasted better milk and butter,
hot biscuits, rice, potatoes, pork and bulberry and wild-
plum jam ; and of course the long days on horseback in the
cold weather gave an edge to our appetites. One stormy
day we lost the hounds, and we spent most of the next day
in finding such of them as did not come straggling in of
their own accord. The country was very rough, and it
was astounding to see some of the places up and down
which we led the horses. Sometimes I found that my
horse climbed rather better than I did, for he would come
up some awkward-looking slope with such a rush that I
literally had to scramble on all-fours to get out of his
way.
There was no special incident connected with killing
either of these two cougars. In one case Gofif himself
took the lead in working out the trail and preventing the
hounds getting off after bobcats. In the other case the
trail was fresher and the dogs ran it by themselves, get-
ting into a country where we could not follow; it was
very rough, and the cliffs and gorges rang with their
baying. In both cases they had the cougar treed for about
54 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
three hours before we were able to place them and walk
up to them. It was hard work, toiling through the snow
over the cliffs toward the baying; and on each occasion
the cougar leaped from the tree at our approach, and ran
a quarter of a mile or so before going up another, where
it was shot. As I came up to shoot, most of the dogs paid
no attention, but Boxer and Nellie always kept looking
at me until I actually raised the rifle, when they began
to spring about the spot where they thought the cougar
would come down. The cougar itself always seemed
to recognize the man as the dangerous opponent; and as
I strode around to find a place from whence I could
deliver an instantaneously fatal shot, it would follow me
steadily with its evil yellow eyes. I came up very close,
but the beasts never attempted to jump at me. Judging
from what one reads in books about Indian and Afri-
can game, a leopard under such circumstances would cer-
tainly sometimes charge.
Three days of our trip were spent on a ride to Colo-
row Mountain; we went down to Judge Foreman's ranch
on White River to pass the night. We got another cou-
gar on the way. She must really be credited to Jim. The
other dogs were following in our footsteps through the
snow, after having made various futile excursions of their
own. When we found that Jim was missing, we tried in
vain to recall him with the horn, and at last started to
hunt him up. After an hour's ride we heard him off on
the mountain, evidently following a trail, but equally
evidently not yet having jumped the animal. The hounds
heard him quite as quickly as we did, and started toward
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS ^5
him. Soon we heard the music of the whole pack, which
grew fainter and fainter, and was lost entirely as they
disappeared around a spur, and then began to grow loud
again, showing that they were coming toward us. Sud-
denly a change in the note convinced us that they had
jumped the quarry. We stood motionless; nearer and
nearer they came; and then a sudden burst of clamor pro-
claimed that they were barking treed. We had to ride
only a couple of hundred yards; I shot the cougar from
across a little ravine. She was the largest female we got.
The dogs were a source of unceasing amusement, not
merely while hunting, but because of their relations to
one another when off duty. Queen's temper was of the
shortest toward the rest of the pack, although, like Turk,
she was fond of literally crawling into my lap, when we
sat down to rest after the worry which closed the chase.
As soon as I began to eat my lunch, all the dogs clustered
close around and I distributed small morsels to each in
turn. Once Jimmie, Queen, and Boxer were sitting side
by side, tightly wedged together. I treated them with
entire impartiality; and soon Queen's feelings overcame
her, and she unostentatiously but firmly bit Jimmie in the
jaw. Jimmie howled tremendously and Boxer literally
turned a back somersault, evidently fearing lest his turn
should come next.
On February nth we rode back to the Keystone
Ranch, carrying the three cougar skins behind our saddles.
It was again very cold, and the snow on the divides was
so deep that our horses wallowed through it up to their
saddle-girths. I supposed that my hunt was practically
56 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
at an end, for I had but three days left; but as it turned
out these were the three most lucky days of the whole
trip.
The weather was beautiful, the snow lying deep
enough to give the dogs easy trailing even on the southern
slopes. Under the clear skies the landscape was daz-
zling, and I had to wear snow-glasses. On the first of the
three days, February 12th, we had not ridden half an
hour from the ranch before we came across the trail of
a very big bobcat. It was so heavy that it had broken
through the crust here and there, and we decided that
it was worth following. The trail went up a steep moun-
tain to the top, and we followed on foot after the dogs.
Among the cliffs on the top they were completely at fault,
hunting every which way. After awhile Goff suddenly
spied the cat, which had jumped off the top of a cliff into
a pinyon. I killed it before any of the dogs saw it, and
at the shot they all ran in the wrong direction. When
they did find us skinning it, they were evidently not at
all satisfied that it was really their bobcat — the one which
they had been trailing. Usually as soon as the animal
was killed they all lay down and dozed off; but on this
occasion they kept hurrying about and then in a body
started on the back trail. It was some time before we
could get them together again.
After we had brought them in we rode across one or
two ridges, and up and down the spurs without finding
anything, until about noon we struck up a long winding
valley where we came across one or two old cougar trails.
The pack were following in our footsteps behind the
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS S7
horses, except Jim, who took off to one side by himself.
Suddenly he began to show signs that he had come across
traces of game; and in another moment he gave tongue
and all the hounds started toward him. They quartered
around in the neighborhood of a little gulch for a short
while, and then streamed off up the mountain-side; and
before they had run more than a couple of minutes we
heard them barking treed. By making a slight turn we
rode almost up to the tree, and saw that their quarry was
a young cougar. As we came up, it knocked Jimmie
right out of the tree. On seeing us it jumped down and
started to run, but it was not quite quick enough. Turk
seized it and in a minute the dogs had it stretched out. It
squawled, hissed, and made such a good fight that I put
an end to the struggle with the knife, fearing lest it might
maim one of the hounds.
While Goff was skinning it I wandered down to the
kill near which it had been lying. This was a deer, al-
most completely devoured. It had been killed in the val-
ley and dragged up perhaps a hundred yards to some
cedars. I soon saw from the tracks around the carcass
that there was an older cougar with the younger one —
doubtless its mother — and walked back to Goff with the
information. Before I got there, however, some of the
pack had made the discovery for themselves. Jim, evi-
dently feeling that he had done his duty, had curled up
and gone to sleep, with most of the others; but old Boxer
and the three bitches (Pete had left her pups and joined
us about the time we roused the big bobcat) , hunted about
until they struck the fresh trail of the old female. They
58 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
went off at a great rate, and the sleeping dogs heard them
and scampered away to the sound. The trail led them
across a spur, into a valley, and out of it up the precipi-
tous side of another mountain. When we got to the edge
of the valley we could hear them barking treed nearly
at the summit of the mountain opposite. It was over an
hour's stiff climbing before we made our way around to
them, although we managed to get the horses up to within
a quarter of a mile of the spot. On approaching we found
the cougar in a leaning pinyon on a ledge at the foot of
a cliff. Jimmie was in the lower branches of the pinyon,
and Turk up above him, within a few feet of the cougar.
Evidently he had been trying to tackle her and had been
knocked out of the tree at least once, for he was bleed-
ing a good deal and there was much blood on the snow
beneath. Yet he had come back into the tree, and was
barking violently not more than three feet beyond her
stroke. She kept up a low savage growling, and as soon
as I appeared, fixed her yellow eyes on me, glaring and
snarling as I worked around into a place from which
I could kill her outright. Meanwhile Goff took up his
position on the other side, hoping to get a photograph
when I shot. My bullet went right through her heart.
She bit her paw, stretched up her head and bit a branch,
and then died where she was, while Turk leaped forward
at the crack of the rifle and seized her in the branches.
I had some difliculty in bundling him and Jimmie out of
the tree as I climbed up to throw down the cougar.
Next morning we started early, intending to go to
Juniper Mountain, where we had heard that cougars
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 59
were plentiful; but we had only ridden about half an
hour from the ranch when we came across a trail which
by the size we knew must belong to an old male. It was
about thirty-six hours old and led into a tangle of bad
lands where there was great difficulty in working it
out. Finally, however, we found where it left these bad
lands and went straight up a mountain-side, too steep for
the horses to follow. From the plains below we watched
the hounds working to and fro until they entered a patch
of pinyons in which we were certain the cougar had
killed a deer, as ravens and magpies were sitting around
in the trees. In these pinyons the hounds were again at
fault for a little while, but at last evidently found the
right trail, and followed it up over the hill-crest and out
of sight. We then galloped hard along the plain to the
left, going around the end of the ridge and turning to
our right on the other side. Here we entered a deep
narrow valley or gorge which led up to a high plateau
at the farther end. On our right, as we rode up the
valley, lay the high and steep ridge over which the hounds
had followed the trail. On the left it was still steeper,
the slope being broken by ledges and precipices. Near
the mouth of the gorge we encountered the hounds, who
had worked the trail down and across the gorge, and were
now hunting up the steep clifT-shoulder on our left. Evi-
dently the cougar had wandered to and fro over this
shoulder, and the dogs were much puzzled and worked
in zigzags and circles around it, gradually getting clear
to the top. Then old Boxer suddenly gave tongue with
renewed zest and started off at a run almost on top of
6o AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the ridge, the other dogs following. Immediately after-
ward they jumped the cougar.
We had been waiting below to see which direction the
chase would take and now put spurs to our horses and
galloped up the ravine, climbing the hillside on our right
so as to get a better view of what was happening. A few
hundred yards of this galloping and climbing brought us
again in sight of the hounds. They were now barking
treed and were clustered around a pinyon below the ridge
crest on the side hill opposite us. The two fighters, Turk
and Queen, who had been following at our horses' heels,
appreciated what had happened as soon as we did, and,
leaving us, ran down into the valley and began to work
their way through the deep snow up the hillside opposite,
toward where the hounds were. Ours was an ideal posi-
tion for seeing the whole chase. In a minute the cougar
jumped out of the tree down among the hounds, who
made no attempt to seize him, but followed him as soon
as he had cleared their circle. He came down hill at a
great rate and jumped over a low cliff, bringing after
him such an avalanche of snow that it was a moment
before I caught sight of him again, this time crouched
on a narrow ledge some fifteen or twenty feet below
the brink from which he had jumped, and about as far
above the foot of the clifif, where the steep hill-slope
again began. The hounds soon found him and came
along the ledge barking loudly, but not venturing near
where he lay facing them, with his back arched like
a great cat. Turk and Queen were meanwhile working
their way up hill. Turk got directly under the ledge
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 6i
and could not find a way up. Queen went to the left and
in a minute we saw her white form as she made her way
through the dark-colored hounds straight for the cougar.
"That's the end of Queen," said Gof?; "he'll kill her
now, sure." In another moment she had made her rush
and the cougar, bounding forward, had seized her, and
as we afterward discovered had driven his great fangs
right through the side of her head, fortunately missing
the brain. In the struggle he lost his footing and rolled
oflf the ledge, and when they struck the ground below he
let go of the bitch. Turk, who was near where they
struck, was not able to spring for the hold he desired, and
in another moment the cougar was coming down hill like
a quarter horse. We stayed perfectly still, as he was
travelling in our direction. Queen was on her feet al-
most as quick as the cougar, and she and Turk tore after
him, the hounds following in a few seconds, being de-
layed in getting off the ledge. It was astonishing to see
the speed of the cougar. He ran considerably more than
a quarter of a mile down hill, and at the end of it had
left the df)gs more than a hundred yards behind. But his
bolt was shot, and after going perhaps a hundred yards
or so up the hill on our side and below us, he climbed
a tree, under which the dogs began to bay frantically,
while we scrambled toward them. When I got down I
found him standing half upright on a big branch, his
forepaws hung over another higher branch, his sides puff-
ing like bellows, and evidently completely winded. In
scrambling up the pinyon he must have struck a patch
of resin, for it had torn a handful of hair off from behind
62 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
his right forearm. I shot him through the heart. At the
shot he sprang clean into the top of the tree, head and
tail up, and his face fairly demoniac with rage; but be-
fore he touched the ground he was dead. Turk jumped
up, seized him as he fell, and the two rolled over a low
ledge, falling about eight feet into the snow, Turk never
losing his hold.
No one could have wished to see a prettier chase un-
der better circumstances. It was exceedingly interesting.
The only dog hurt was Queen, and very miserable indeed
she looked. She stood in the trail, refusing to lie down
or to join the other dogs, as, with prodigious snarls at one
another, they ate the pieces of the carcass we cut out for
them. Dogs hunting every day, as these were doing, and
going through such terrific exertion, need enormous
quantities of meat, and as old horses and crippled steers
were not always easy to get, we usually fed them the cou-
gar carcasses. On this occasion, when they had eaten
until they could eat no longer, I gave most of my lunch to
Queen — Boxer, who after his feast could hardly move,
nevertheless waddling up with his ears forward to beg
a share. Queen evidently felt that the lunch was a deli-
cacy, for she ate it, and then trotted home behind us with
the rest of the dogs. Rather to my astonishment, next
day she was all right, and as eager to go with us as ever.
Though one side of her head was much swollen, in her
work she showed no signs of her injuries.
Early the following morning, February 14th, the last
day of my actual hunting, we again started for Juniper
Mountain, following the same course on which we had
I
i
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 63
started the previous day. Before we had gone a mile,
that is, only about half-way to where we had come across
the cougar track the preceding day, we crossed another,
and as we deemed a fresher, trail, which Gofif pronounced
to belong to a cougar even larger than the one we had
just killed. The hounds were getting both weary and
footsore, but the scent put heart into them and away they
streamed. They followed it across a sage-brush fiat, and
then worked along under the base of a line of cliffs — cou-
gar being particularly apt thus to travel at the foot of
cliffs. The pack kept well together, and it was pleasant,
as we cantered over the snowy plain beside them, to lis-
ten to their baying, echoed back from the cliffs above.
Then they worked over the hill and we spurred ahead
and turned to the left, up the same gorge or valley in
which we had killed the cougar the day before. The
hounds followed the trail straight to the cliff-shoulder
where the day before the pack had been puzzled until
Boxer struck the fresh scent. Here they seemed to be
completely at fault, circling everywhere, and at one time
following their track of yesterday over to the pinyon-tree
up which the cougar had first gone.
We made our way up the ravine to the head of the
plateau, and then, turning, came back along the ridge
until we reached the top of the shoulder where the dogs
had been; but when we got there they had disappeared.
It did not seem likely that the cougar had crossed the
ravine behind us — although as a matter of fact this was
exactly what had happened — and we did not know what
to make of the affair.
64 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
We could barely hear the hounds; they had followed
their back trail of the preceding day, toward the place
where we had first come across the tracks of the cougar
we had already killed. We were utterly puzzled, even
Gofif being completely at fault, and we finally became
afraid that the track which the pack had been running
was one which, instead of having been made during the
night, had been there the previous morning, and had been
made by the dead cougar. This meant, of course, that
we had passed it without noticing it, both going and com-
ing, on the previous day, and knowing Gofif's eye for a
track I could not believe this. He, however, thought we
might have confused it with some of the big wolf tracks,
of which a number had crossed our path. After some
hesitation, he said that at any rate we could find out the
truth by getting back into the flat and galloping around
to where we had begun our hunt the day before; because
if the dogs really had a fresh cougar before them he must
have so short a start that they were certain to tree him
by the time they got across the ridge-crest. Accordingly
we scrambled down the precipitous mountain-side, gal-
loped along the flat around the end of the ridge and drew
rein at about the place where we had first come across
the cougar trail on the previous day. Not a dog was to
be heard anywhere, and Gold's belief that the pack was
simply running a back track became a certainty both in
his mind and mine, when Jim suddenly joined us, evi-
dently having given up the chase. We came to the con-
clusion that Jim, being wiser than the other dogs, had
discovered his mistake while they had not; " he just nat-
urally quit," said Gofif.
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 65
After some little work we found where the pack had
crossed the broad fiat valley into a mass of very rough
broken country, the same in which I had shot my first
big male by moonlight. Cantering and scrambling
through this stretch of cliffs and valleys, we began to hear
the dogs, and at first were puzzled because once or twice
it seemed as though they were barking treed or had some-
thing at bay; always, however, as we came nearer we
could again hear them running a trail, and when we
finally got up tolerably close we found that they were all
scattered out. Boxer was far behind, and Nellie, whose
feet had become sore, was soberly accompanying him, no
longer giving tongue. The others were separated one
from the other, and we finally made out Tree'em all by
himself, and not very far away. In vain Goff called and
blew his horn; Tree'em disappeared up a high hillside,
and with muttered comments on his stupidity we gal-
loped our horses along the valley around the foot of the
hill, hoping to intercept him. No sooner had we come
to the other side, however, than we heard Tree'em evi-
dently barking treed. We looked at one another, won-
dering whether he had come across a bobcat, or whether
it had really been a fresh cougar trail after all.
Leaving our horses we scrambled up the canyon until
we got in sight of a large pinyon on the hillside, under-
neath which Tree'em was standing, with his preposter-
ous tail arched like a pump-handle, as he gazed solemnly
up in the tree, now and then uttering a bark at a huge
cougar, which by this time we could distinctly make out
standing in the branches. Turk and Queen had already
66 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
left us and were running hard to join Tree'em, and in an-
other minute or two all of the hounds, except the belated
Boxer and Nellie, had also come up. The cougar having
now recovered his wind, jumped down and cantered off.
He had been running for three hours before the dogs and
evidently had been overtaken again and again, but had
either refused to tree, or if he did tree had soon come
down and continued his flight, the hounds not venturing
to meddle with him, and he paying little heed to them.
It was a different matter, however, with Turk and Queen
along. He went up the hill and came to bay on the top
of the cliffs, where we could see him against the skyline.
The hounds surrounded him, but neither they nor Turk
came to close quarters. Queen, however, as soon as she
arrived rushed straight in, and the cougar knocked her
a dozen feet off. Turk tried to seize him as soon as Queen
had made her rush ; the cougar broke bay, and they all dis-
appeared over the hill-top, while we hurried after them.
A quarter of a mile beyond, on the steep hillside, they
again had him up a pinyon-tree. I approached as cau-
tiously as possible so as not to alarm him. He stood in
such an awkward position that I could not get a fair
shot at the heart, but the bullet broke his back, and
the dogs seized him as he struck the ground. There
was still any amount of fight in him, and I ran in as
fast as possible, jumping and slipping over the rocks
and the bushes as the cougar and dogs rolled and slid
down the steep mountain-side — for, of course, every min-
ute's delay meant the chance of a dog being killed or
crippled. It was a day of misfortunes for Jim, who was
WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 67
knocked completely out of the fight by a single blow.
The cougar was too big for the dogs to master, even crip-
pled as he was; but when I came up close Turk ran in
and got the great beast by one ear, stretching out the cou-
gar's head, while he kept his own forelegs tucked way
back so that the cougar could not get hold of them. This
gave me my chance and I drove the knife home, leaping
back before the creature could get round at me. Boxer
did not come up for half an hour, working out every inch
of the trail for himself, and croaking away at short in-
tervals, while Nellie trotted calmly beside him. Even
when he saw us skinning the cougar he would not hurry
nor take a short cut, but followed the scent to where the
cougar had gone up the tree, and from the tree down to
where we were; then he meditatively bit the carcass,
strolled off, and lay down, satisfied.
It was a very large cougar, fat and heavy, and the men
at the ranch believed it was the same one which had at
intervals haunted the place for two or three years, kill-
ing on one occasion a milch cow, on another a steer, and
on yet another a big work horse. Goff stated that he had
on two or three occasions killed cougars that were quite
as long, and he believed even an inch or two longer, but
that he had never seen one as large or as heavy. Its
weight was 227 pounds, and as it lay stretched out it
looked like a small African lioness. It would be im-
possible to wish a better ending to a hunt.
The next day Goff and I cantered thirty miles into
Meeker, and my holiday was over.
CHAPTER II
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT
In mid-April, nineteen hundred and five, our party,
consisting of Philip B. Stewart, of Colorado Springs, and
Dr. Alexander Lambert, of New York, in addition to my-
self, left Newcastle, Col., for a bear hunt. As guides and
hunters we had John Gofif and Jake Borah, than whom
there are no better men at their work of hunting bear
in the mountains with hounds. Each brought his own
dogs; all told, there were twenty-six hounds, and four
half-blood terriers to help worry the bear when at bay.
We travelled in comfort, with a big pack train, spare
horses for each of us, and a cook, packers, and horse
wranglers. I carried one of the new model Springfield
military rifles, a 30-40, with a soft-nosed bullet — a very
accurate and hard-hitting gun.
This first day we rode about twenty miles to where
camp was pitched on the upper waters of East Divide
Creek. It was a picturesque spot. At this altitude it was
still late winter and the snow lay in drifts, even in the
creek bottom, while the stream itself was not yet clear
from ice. The tents were pitched in a grove of leafless
aspens and great spruces, beside the rushing, ice-rimmed
brook. The cook tent, with its stove, was an attractive
place on the cool mornings and in stormy weather. Fry,
68
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 69
the cook, a most competent man, had rigged up a table,
and we had folding camp-chairs — luxuries utterly un-
known to my former camping trips. Each day we break-
fasted early and dined ten or twelve hours later, on re-
turning from the day's hunt; and as we carried no lunch,
the two meals were enjoyed with ravenous pleasure by the
entire company. The horses were stout, tough, shaggy
beasts, of wonderful staying power, and able to climb like
cats. The country was very steep and rugged; the moun-
tain-sides were greasy and slippery from the melting
snow, while the snow bucking through the deep drifts on
their tops and on the north sides was exhausting. Only
sure-footed animals could avoid serious tumbles, and only
animals of great endurance could have lasted through
the work. Both Johnny Goflf and his partner. Brick
Wells, who often accompanied us on the hunts, were fre-
quently mounted on animals of uncertain temper, with
a tendency to buck on insufficient provocation; but they
rode them with entire indifference up and down any
incline. One of the riders, " Al," a very good tempered
man, a tireless worker, had as one of his horses a queer,
big-headed dun beast, with a black stripe down its back
and traces of zebra-like bands on the backs of his front
legs. He was an atavistic animal, looking much as the
horses must have looked which an age or two ago lived
in this very locality and were preyed on by sabre-toothed
tigers, hyenadons, and other strange and terrible beasts
of a long-vanished era. Lambert remarked to him: " Al,
you ought to call that horse of yours ' Fossil'; he is a
hundred thousand years old." To which Al, with im-
70 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
movable face, replied: " Gee! and that man sold him to
me for a seven-year-old! I'll have the law on him! "
The hounds were most interesting, and showed all the
variations of character and temper to be expected in such
a pack; a pack in which performance counted for every-
thing and pedigree for nothing. One of the best hounds
was half fox terrier. Three of Johnny's had been with
us four years before, when he and I hunted cougars to-
gether; these three being Jim, now an old dog, who
dropped behind in a hard run, but still excellent on a
cold trail; Tree'em, who, like Jim, had grown aged, but
was very sure; and Bruno, who had become one of the
best of all the pack on a hot trail, but who was apt to over-
run it if it became at all difficult and cold. The biggest
dog of the pack, a very powerful animal, was Badge, who
was half foxhound and half what Johnny called Siberian
bloodhound — I suppose a Great Dane or Ulm dog. His
full brother Bill came next to him. There was a Rowdy
in Jake's pack and another Rowdy in Johnny's, and each
got badly hurt before the hunt was through. Jake's
Rowdy, as soon as an animal was killed, became very
cross and wished to attack any dog that came near. One of
Jake's best hounds was old Bruise, a very sure, although
not a particularly fast dog. All the members of the pack
held the usual wild-beast attitude toward one another.
They joined together for the chase and the fight, but once
the quarry was killed, their relations among themselves
became those of active hostility or selfish indifference.
At feeding time each took whatever his strength per-
mitted, and each paid abject deference to whichever ani-
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 71
mal was his known superior in prowess. Some of the
younger dogs would now and then run deer or coyote.
But the older dogs paid heed only to bear and bobcat; and
the pack, as a body, discriminated sharply between the
hounds they could trust and those which would go off
on a wrong trail. The four terriers included a heavy,
liver-colored half-breed bull-dog, a preposterous animal
who looked as if his ancestry had included a toadfish.
He was a terrible fighter, but his unvarying attitude tow-
ard mankind was one of effusive and rather foolish
affection. In a fight he could whip any of the hounds
save Badge, and he was far more willing than Badge to
accept punishment. There was also a funny little black
and tan, named Skip, a most friendly little fellow, espe-
cially fond of riding in front or behind the saddle of any
one of us who would take him up, although perfectly
able to travel forty miles a day on his own sturdy legs if
he had to, and then to join in the worry of the quarry
when once it had been shot. Porcupines abounded in the
woods, and one or two of the terriers and half a dozen
of the hounds positively refused to learn any wisdom,
invariably attacking each porcupine they found; the re-
sult being that we had to spend many minutes in removing
the quills from their mouths, eyes, etc. A white bull-ter-
rier would come in from such a combat with his nose
literally looking like a glorified pincushion, and many of
the spines we had to take out with nippers. The terriers
never ran with the hounds, but stayed behind with the
horses until they heard the hounds barking " bayed " or
" treed," when they forthwith tore toward them. Skip
72 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
adopted me as his special master, rode with me whenever
I would let him, and slept on the foot of my bed at night,
growling defiance at anything that came near. I grew
attached to the friendly, bright little fellow, and at the
end of the hunt took him home with me as a playmate
for the children.
It was a great, wild country. In the creek bottoms
there were a good many ranches ; but we only occasionally
passed by these, on our way to our hunting grounds in the
wilderness along the edge of the snow-line. The moun-
tains crowded close together in chain, peak, and table-
land; all the higher ones were wrapped in an unrent
shroud of snow. We saw a good many deer, and fresh
sign of elk, but no elk themselves, although we were in-
formed that bands were to be found in the high spruce
timber where the snows were so deep that it would have
been impossible to go on horseback, while going on foot
would have been inconceivably fatiguing. The country
was open. The high peaks were bare of trees. Cotton-
woods, and occasionally dwarfed birch or maple and wil-
lows, fringed the streams; aspens grew in groves higher
up. There were pinyons and cedars on the slopes of the
foothills; spruce clustered here and there in the cooler
ravines and valleys and high up the mountains. The
dense oak brush and thick growing cedars were hard on
our clothes, and sometimes on our bodies.
Bear and cougars had once been very plentiful
throughout this region, but during the last three or four
years the cougars have greatly diminished in numbers
throughout northern Colorado, and the bears have dimin-
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 73
ished also, although not to the same extent. The great
grizzlies which were once fairly plentiful here are now
very rare, as they are in most places in the United States.
There remain plenty of the black and brown bears, which
are simply individual color phases of the same species.
Bears are interesting creatures and their habits are
always worth watching. When I used to hunt grizzlies
my experience tended to make me lay special emphasis
on their variation in temper. There are savage and cow-
ardly bears, just as there are big and little ones; and
sometimes these variations are very marked among bears
of the same district, and at other times all the bears of
one district will seem to have a common code of behavior
which differs utterly from that of the bears of another
district. Readers of Lewis and Clark do not need to be
reminded of the great difference they found in ferocity
between the bears of the upper Missouri and the bears of
the Columbia River country; and those who have lived
in the upper Missouri country nowadays know how wide-
ly the bears that still remain have altered in character
from what they were as recently as the middle of the last
century.
This variability has been shown in the bears which
I have stumbled upon at close quarters. On but one oc-
casion was I ever regularly charged by a grizzly. To this
animal I had given a mortal wound, and without any
effort at retaliation he bolted into a thicket of what, in
my hurry, I thought was laurel (it being composed in
reality, I suppose, of thick-growing berry bushes). On
my following him and giving him a second wound, he
74 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
charged very determinedly, taking two more bullets with-
out flinching. I just escaped the charge by jumping to
one side, and he died almost immediately after striking at
me as he rushed by. This bear charged with his mouth
open, but made very little noise after the growl or roar
with which he greeted my second bullet. I mention the
fact of his having kept his mouth open, because one or two
of my friends who have been charged have informed me
that in their cases they particularly noticed that the bear
charged with his mouth shut. Perhaps the fact that my
bear was shot through the lungs may account for the dif-
ference, or it may simply be another example of indi-
vidual variation.
On another occasion, in a windfall, I got up within
eight or ten feet of a grizzly, which simply bolted off, pay-
ing no heed to a hurried shot which I delivered as I
poised unsteadily on the swaying top of an overthrown
dead pine. On yet another occasion, when I roused a big
bear from his sleep, he at the first moment seemed to pay
little or no heed to me, and then turned toward me in a
leisurely way, the only sign of hostility he betrayed being
to ruffle up the hair on his shoulders and the back of his
neck. I hit him square between the eyes, and he dropped
like a pole-axed steer.
On another occasion I got up quite close to and mor-
tally wounded a bear, which ran off without uttering a
sound until it fell dead; but another of these grizzlies,
which I shot from ambush, kept squalling and yelling
every time I hit him, making a great rumpus. On one
occasion one of my cow hands and myself were able to
<; M)
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 75
run down on foot a she grizzly bear and her cub, which
had obtained a long start of us, simply because of the
foolish conduct of the mother. The cub — or more prop-
erly the yearling, for it was a cub of the second year —
ran on far ahead, and would have escaped if the old she
had not continually stopped and sat up on her hind legs
to look back at us. I think she did this partly from curi-
osity, but partly also from bad temper, for once or twice
she grinned and roared at us. The upshot of it was that I
got within range and put a bullet in the old she, who
afterward charged my companion and was killed; and
we also got the yearling.
One young grizzly which I killed many years ago
dropped to the first bullet, which entered its stomach. It
then let myself and my companion approach closely, look-
ing up at us with alert curiosity, but making no effort
to escape. It was really not crippled at all, but we
thought from its actions that its back was broken, and my
companion advanced to kill it with his pistol. The pistol,
however, did not inflict a mortal wound, and the only
effect was to make the young bear jump to its feet as if
unhurt, and race off at full speed through the timber; for
though not full grown it was beyond cubhood, being
probably about eighteen months old. By desperate run-
ning I succeeded in getting another shot, and more by
luck than by anything else knocked it over, this time per-
manently.
Black bear are not, under normal conditions, formi-
dable brutes. If they do charge and get home they may
maul a man severely, and there are a number of instances
76 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
on record in which they have killed men. Ordinarily,
however, a black bear will not charge home, though he
may bluster a good deal. I once shot one very close up
which made a most lamentable outcry, and seemed to lose
its head, its efforts to escape resulting in its bouncing
about among the trees with such heedless hurry that I
was easily able to kill it. Another black bear, which I
also shot at close quarters, came straight for my compan-
ions and myself, and almost ran over the white hunter
who was with me. This bear made no sound whatever
when I first hit it, and I do not think it was charging. I
believe it was simply dazed, and by accident ran the
wrong way, and so almost came into collision with us.
However, when it found itself face to face with the white
hunter, and only four or five feet away, it prepared for
hostilities, and I think would have mauled him if I had
not brained it with another bullet; for I was myself stand-
ing but six feet or so to one side of it. None of the bears
shot on this Colorado trip made a sound when hit; they
all died silently, like so many wolves.
Ordinarily, my experience has been that bears were
not flurried when I suddenly came upon them. They
impressed me as if they were always keeping in mind the
place toward which they wished to retreat in the event
of danger, and for this place, which was invariably a
piece of rough ground or dense timber, they made off
with all possible speed, not seeming to lose their heads.
Frequently I have been able to watch bears for some
time while myself unobserved. With other game I have
very often done this even when within close range, not
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT
11
wishing to kill creatures needlessly, or without a good
object; but with bears, my experience has been that
chances to secure them come so seldom as to make it very
distinctly worth while improving any that do come, and
I have not spent much time watching any bear unless he
was in a place where I could not get at him, or else was
so close at hand that I was not afraid of his getting away.
On one occasion the bear was hard at work digging up
squirrel or gopher caches on the side of a pine-clad hill;
while at this work he looked rather like a big badger.
On two other occasions the bear was fussing around a car-
cass preparatory to burying it. On these occasions I was
very close, and it was extremely interesting to note the
grotesque, half-human movements, and giant, awkward
strength of the great beast. He would twist the carcass
around with the utmost ease, sometimes taking it in his
teeth and dragging it, at other times grasping it in his
forepaws and half lifting, half shoving it. Once the bear
lost his grip and rolled over during the course of some
movement, and this made him angry, and he struck the
carcass a savage whack, just as a pettish child will strike
a table against which it has knocked itself. At another
time I watched a black bear some distance off getting
his breakfast under stumps and stones. He was very ac-
tive, turning the stone or log over, and then thrusting his
muzzle into the empty space to gobble up the small creat-
ures below before they recovered from their surprise and
the sudden inflow of light. From under one log he put
a chipmunk, and danced hither and thither with even
more agility than awkwardness, slapping at the chip-
78 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
munk with his paw while it zigzagged about, until finally
he scooped it into his mouth.
All this was in the old days when I was still-hunting,
with only the rifle. This Colorado trip was the first on
which I hunted bears with hounds. If we had run across
a grizzly there would doubtless have been a chance to
show some prowess, at least in the way of hard riding.
But the black and brown bears cannot, save under ex-
ceptional circumstances, escape from such a pack as we
had with us; and the real merit of the chase was confined
to the hounds and to Jake and Johnny for their skill in
handling them. Perhaps I should add the horses, for
their extraordinary endurance and surefootedness. As
for the rest of us, we needed to do little more than to
sit ten or twelve hours in the saddle and occasionally lead
the horses up or down the most precipitous and cliff-like
of the mountain sides. But it was great fun, nevertheless,
and usually a chase lasted long enough to be interesting.
The first day after reaching camp we rode for eleven
hours over a very difficult country, but without getting
above the snow-line. Finally the dogs got on the fresh
trail of a bobcat, and away they went. A bobcat will
often give a good run, much better, on the average, than
a cougar; and this one puzzled the dogs not a little at
first. It scrambled out of one deep valley, crossing and
recrossing the rock ledges where its scent was hard to
follow; then plunged into another valley. Meanwhile
we had ridden up on the high mountain spur betw^een the
two valleys, and after scrambling and galloping to and
fro as the cry veered from point to point when the dogs
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 79
changed directions, we saw them cross into the second
valley. Here again they took a good deal of time to
puzzle out the trail, and became somewhat scattered. We
had dismounted and were standing by the horses' heads,
listening to the baying and trying to decide which way
we should go, when Stewart suddenly pointed us out a
bear. It was on the other side of the valley from us, and
perhaps half a mile away, galloping down hill, with two
of the hounds after it, and in the sunlight its fur looked
glossy black. In a minute or two it passed out of sight
in the thick-growing timber at the bottom of the valley;
and as we afterward found, the two hounds, getting mo-
mentarily thrown out, and hearing the others still baying
on the cat trail, joined the latter. Jake started ofif to go
around the head of the valley, while the rest of us plunged
dow^n into it. We found from the track that the bear
had gone up the valley, and Jake found where he had
come out on the high divide, and then turned and re-
traced his steps. But the hounds were evidently all after
the cat. There was nothing for us to do but follow them.
Sometimes riding, sometimes leading the horses, we went
up the steep hillside, and as soon as we reached the crest
heard the hounds barking treed. Shorty and Skip, who
always trotted after the horses while the hounds were in
full cry on a trail, recognized the change of note im-
mediately, and tore ofif in the direction of the bay, while
we followed as best we could, hoping to get there in time
for Stewart and Lambert to take photographs of the lynx
in a tree. But we were too late. Both Shorty and Skip
could climb trees, and although Skip was too light to
8o AN AMERICAN HUNTER
tackle a bobcat by himself, Shorty, a heavy, formidable
dog, of unflinching courage and great physical strength,
was altogether too much for any bobcat. When we
reached the place we found the bobcat in the top of a
pinyon, and Shorty steadily working his way up through
the branches and very near the quarry. Evidently the
bobcat felt that the situation needed the taking of desper-
ate chances, and just before Shorty reached it out it
jumped. Shorty yelling with excitement as he plunged
down through the branches after it. But the cat did not
jump far enough. One of the hounds seized it by the
hind leg and in another second everything was over.
Shorty was always the first of the pack to attack dan-
gerous game, and in attacking bear or cougar even Badge
was much less reckless and more wary. In consequence.
Shorty was seamed over with scars; most of them from
bobcats, but one or two from cougars. He could speedily
kill a bobcat single-handed; for these small lynxes are not
really formidable fighters, although they will lacerate a
dog quite severely. Shorty found a badger a much more
difficult antagonist than a bobcat. A bobcat in a hole
makes a hard fight, however. On this hunt we once got
a bobcat under a big rock, and Jake's Rowdy in trying to
reach it got so badly mauled that he had to join the
invalid class for several days.
The bobcat we killed this first day was a male, weigh-
ing twenty-five pounds. It was too late to try after the
bear, especially as we had only ten or a dozen dogs out,
while the bear's tracks showed it to be a big one; and
we rode back to camp.
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 8i
Next morning we rode off early, taking with us all
twenty-six hounds and the four terriers. We wished first
to find whether the bear had gone out of the country in
which we had seen him, and so rode up a valley and then
scrambled laboriously up the mountain-side to the top of
the snow-covered divide. Here the snow was three feet
deep in places, and the horses plunged and floundered as
we worked our way in single file through the drifts. But
it had frozen hard the previous night, so that a bear could
walk on the crust and leave very little sign. In conse-
quence we came near passing over the place where the
animal we were after had actually crossed out of the
canyon-like ravine in which we had seen him and gone
over the divide into another set of valleys. The trail was
so faint that it puzzled us, as we could not be certain how
fresh it was, and until this point could be cleared up we
tried to keep the hounds from following it. Old Jim,
however, slipped off to one side and speedily satisfied
himself that the trail was fresh. Along it he went, giving
tongue, and the other dogs were maddened by the sound,
while Jim, under such circumstances, paid no heed what-
ever to any effort to make him come back. Accordingly,
the other hounds were slipped after him, and down they
ran into the valley, while we slid, floundered, and scram-
bled along the ridge crest parallel to them, until a couple
of miles farther on we worked our way down to some
great slopes covered with dwarf scrub-oak. At the edge
of these slopes, where they fell off in abrupt descent to
the stream at the bottom of the valley, we halted. Op-
posite us was a high and very rugged mountain-side cov-
82 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
ered with a growth of pinyon — never a close-grow-
ing tree — its precipitous flanks broken by ledges and
scored by gullies and ravines. It was hard to follow the
scent across such a mountain-side, and the dogs speedily
became much scattered. We could hear them plainly,
and now and then could see them, looking like ants as
they ran up and down hill and along the ledges. Finally
we heard some of them barking bayed. The volume of
sound increased steadily as the straggling dogs joined
those which had first reached the hunted animal. At
about this time, to our astonishment, Badge, usually a
stanch fighter, rejoined us, followed by one or two other
hounds, who seemed to have had enough of the matter.
Immediately afterward we saw the bear, half-way up the
opposite mountain-side. The hounds were all around
him, and occasionally bit at his hind quarters; but he had
evidently no intention of climbing a tree. When we first
saw him he was sitting up on a point of rock surrounded
by the pack, his black fur showing to fine advantage.
Then he moved ofif, threatening the dogs, and making
what in Mississippi is called a walking bay. He was a
sullen, powerful beast, and his leisurely gait showed how
little he feared the pack, and how confident he was in his
own burly strength. By this time the dogs had been after
him for a couple of hours, and as there was no water on
the mountain-side we feared they might be getting ex-
hausted, and rode toward them as rapidly as we could.
It was a hard climb up to where they were, and we had
to lead the horses. Just as we came in sight of him, across
a deep gully which ran down the sheer mountain-side,
DEATH OF THE BIG BEAR
From a photograpli by I*hilip B. Stewart
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 83
he broke bay and started off, threatening the foremost of
the pack as they dared to approach him. They were all
around him, and for a minute I could not fire; then as
he passed under a pinyon I got a clear view of his great
round stern and pulled trigger. The bullet broke both
his hips, and he rolled down hill, the hounds yelling with
excitement as they closed in on him. He could still play
havoc with the pack, and there was need to kill him at
once. I leaped and slid down my side of the gully as
he rolled down his; at the bottom he stopped and
raised himself on his fore quarters; and with another
bullet I broke his back between the shoulders.
Immediately all the dogs began to worry the carcass,
while their savage baying echoed so loudly in the narrow,
steep gully that we could with difficulty hear one another
speak. It was a wild scene to look upon, as we scrambled
down to where the dead bear lay on his back between
the rocks. He did not die wholly unavenged, for he had
killed one of the terriers and six other dogs were more
or less injured. The chase of the bear is grim work for
the pack. Jim, usually a very wary fighter, had a couple
of deep holes in his thigh; but the most mishandled of
the wounded dogs was Shorty. With his usual dauntless
courage he had gone straight at the bear's head. Being
such a heavy, powerful animal, I think if he had been
backed up he could have held the bear's head down, and
prevented the beast from doing much injury. As it was,
the bear bit through the side of Shorty's head, and bit
him in the shoulder, and again in the hip, inflicting very
bad wounds. Once the fight was over Shorty lay down on
84 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the hillside, unable to move. When we started home we
put him beside a little brook, and left a piece of bear meat
by him, as it was obvious we could not get him to camp
that day. Next day one of the boys went back with a
pack-horse to take him in; but half-way out met him
struggling toward camp, and returned. Late in the after-
noon Shorty turned up while we were at dinner, and stag-
gered toward us, wagging his tail with enthusiastic de-
light at seeing his friends. We fed him until he could not
hold another mouthful ; then he curled up in a dry corner
of the cook-tent and slept for forty-eight hours; and two
or three days afterward was able once more to go hunting.
The bear was a big male, weighing three hundred and
thirty pounds. On examination at close quarters, his fur,
which was in fine condition, was not as black as it had
seemed when seen afar off, the roots of the hairs being
brown. There was nothing whatever in his stomach.
Evidently he had not yet begun to eat, and had been but
a short while out of his hole. Bear feed very little when
they first come out of their dens, sometimes beginning on
grass, sometimes on buds. Occasionally they will feed at
carcasses and try to kill animals within a week or two
after they have left winter quarters, but this is rare, and as
a usual thing for the first few weeks after they have come
out they feed much as a deer would. Although not hog
fat, as would probably have been the case in the fall, this
bear was in good condition. In the fall, however, he
would doubtless have weighed over four hundred pounds.
The three old females we got on this trip weighed one
hundred and eighty, one hundred and seventy-five, and
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 85
one hundred and thirty-five pounds apiece. The year-
lings weighed from thirty-one to forty pounds. The
only other black bears I ever weighed all belonged to the
sub-species Luteolus, and were killed on the Little Sun-
flower River, in Mississippi, in the late fall of nineteen
hundred and two. A big old male, in poor condition,
weighed two hundred and eighty-five pounds, and two
very fat females weighed two hundred and twenty and
two hundred and thirty-five pounds respectively.
The next few days we spent in hunting perseveringly,
but unsuccessfully. Each day we were from six to twelve
hours in the saddle, climbing with weary toil up the
mountains and slipping and scrambling down them. On
the tops and on the north slopes there was much snow,
so that we had to pick our trails carefully, and even thus
the horses often floundered belly-deep as we worked
along in single file; the men on the horses which were
best at snow bucking took turns in breaking the trail.
In the worst places we had to dismount and lead the
horses, often over such bad ground that nothing less sure-
footed than the tough mountain ponies could even have
kept their legs. The weather was cold, with occasional
sharp flurries of snow, and once a regular snow-storm.
We found the tracks of one or two bears, but in each case
several days old, and it was evident either that the bears
had gone back to their dens, finding the season so late,
or else that they were lying quiet in sheltered places, and
travelling as little as possible. One day, after a long run
of certainly five or six miles through very difficult coun-
try, the dogs treed a bobcat in a big cedar. It had run so
86 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
far that it was badly out of breath. Stewart climbed
the tree and took several photographs of it, pushing the
camera up to within about four feet of where the cat
sat. Lambert obtained photographs of both Stewart and
the cat. Shorty was at this time still an invalid from his
encounter with the bear, but Skip worked his way thirty
feet up the tree in his effort to get at the bobcat. Lam-
bert shot the latter with his revolver, the bobcat dying
stuck in the branches; and he then had to climb the tree
to get both the bobcat and Skip, as the latter was at such
a height that we thought he would hurt himself if he
fell. Another bobcat when treed sealed his own fate
by stepping on a dead branch and falling right into the
jaws of the pack.
At this camp, as everywhere, the tiny four-striped
chipmunks were plentiful and tame; they are cheerful,
attractive little animals. We also saw white-footed mice
and a big meadow mouse around camp ; and we found
a young brushy-tailed pack-rat. The snowshoe rabbits
were still white on the mountains, but in the lower valleys
they had changed to the summer pelage. On the moun-
tains we occasionally saw woodchucks and rock squirrels
of two kinds, a large and a small — Spermophilus gram-
murus and armatus. The noisy, cheerful pine squirrels
were common where the woods were thick. There were
eagles and ravens in the mountains, and once we saw
sandhill cranes soaring far above the highest peaks. - The
long-crested jays came familiarly around camp, but on
this occasion we only saw the whiskey-jacks, Clark's nut-
crackers and magpies, while off in the mountains.
STEWART AND THE BOBCAT
From a photograph, copyright, 1905, by Alexander Lambert, M.D.
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 87
Among the pinyons, we several times came across strag-
gling flocks of the queer pinyon jays or blue crows, with
their unmistakable calls and almost blacxkbird-like habits.
There were hawks of several species, and blue grouse,
while the smaller birds included flickers, robins, and the
beautiful mountain bluebirds. Juncos and mountain
chickadees were plentiful, and the ruby-crowned kinglets
were singing with astonishing power for such tiny birds.
We came on two nests of the red-tailed hawk; the birds
were brooding, and seemed tame and unwary.
After a week of this we came to the conclusion that
the snow was too deep and the weather too cold for us to
expect to get any more bear in the immediate neighbor-
hood, and accordingly shifted camp to where Clear Creek
joins West Divide Creek.
The first day's hunt from the new camp was success-
ful. We were absent about eleven hours and rode some
forty miles. The day included four hours' steady snow
bucking, for the bear, as soon as they got the chance, went
through the thick timber where the snow lay deepest.
Some tw^o hours after leaving camp we found the old
tracks of a she and a yearling, but it took us a much longer
time before we finally struck the fresh trail made late the
previous night or early in the morning. It was Jake who
first found this fresh track, while Johnny with the pack
was a couple of miles away, slowly but surely puzzling
out the cold trail and keeping the dogs up to their work.
As soon as Johnny came up we put all the hounds on the
tracks, and away they went, through and over the snow,
yelling their eager delight. Meanwhile we had fixed our
88 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
saddles and were ready for what lay ahead. It was
wholly impossible to ride at the tail of the pack, but we
did our best to keep within sound of the baying. Finally,
after much hard work and much point riding through
snow, slush, and deep mud, on the level, and along, up,
and down sheer slopes, we heard the dogs barking treed
in the middle of a great grove of aspens high up the
mountain-side. The snow was too deep for the horses,
and leaving them, we trudged heavily up on foot. The
yearling was in the top of a tall aspen. Lambert shot
it with his rifle and we then put the dogs on the trail of
the old she. Some of the young ones did not know what
to make of this, evidently feeling that the tracks must be
those of the bear that they had already killed; but the
veterans were in full cry at once. We scrambled after
them up the steep mountain, and then downward along
ridges and spurs, getting all the clear ground we could.
Finally we had to take to the snow, and floundered and
slid through the drifts until we were in the valley. Most
of the time the dogs were within hearing, giving tongue
as they followed the trail. Finally a total change in the
note showed that they were barking treed; and as rapidly
as possible we made our way toward the sound. Again
we found ourselves unable to bring the horses up to where
the bear had treed, and scrambled thither on foot through
the deep snow.
The bear was some thirty or forty feet up a tall
spruce; it was a big she, with a glossy black-brown coat.
I was afraid that at our approach she might come down;
but she had been running hard for some four hours, had
THE PACK BAYING THE BEAR
From a photograpli, copyriglit, loo;. by Alexander Lambert, M.D.
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 89
been pressed close, and evidently had not the slightest
idea of putting herself of her own free will within the
reach of the pack, which was now frantically baying at
the foot of the tree. I shot her through the heart. As
the bullet struck she climbed up through the branches
with great agility for six or eight feet; then her muscles
relaxed, and down she came with a thud, nearly burying
herself in the snow. Little Skip was one of the first dogs
to seize her as she came down; and in another moment
he literally disappeared under the hounds as they piled
on the bear. As soon as possible we got off the skin and
pushed campward at a good gait, for we were a long
way off. Just at nightfall we came out on a bluff from
which we could overlook the rushing, swirling brown
torrent, on the farther bank of which the tents were
pitched.
The stomach of this bear contained nothing but buds.
Like the other shes killed on this trip, she was accom-
panied by her yearling young, but had no newly born
cub; sometimes bear breed only every other year, but
I have found the mother accompanied not only by her
cub but by her young of the year before. The yearling
also had nothing but buds in its stomach. When its skin
was taken off, Stewart looked at it, shook his head, and
turning to Lambert said solemnly, " Alex., that skin isn't
big enough to use for anything but a doily." From that
time until the end of the hunt the yearlings were only
known as " doily bears."
Next morning we again went out, and this time for
twelve hours steadily, in the saddle, and now and then
90
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
on foot. Most of the time we were in snow, and it was
extraordinary that the horses could get through it at all,
especially in working up the steep mountain-sides. But
until it got so deep that they actually floundered — that is,
so long as they could get their legs down to the bottom —
I found that they could travel much faster than I could.
On this day some twenty good-natured, hard-riding
young fellows from the ranches within a radius of a
dozen miles had joined our party to " see the President
kill a bear." They were a cheerful and eagerly friendly
crowd, as hardy as so many young moose, and utterly fear-
less horsemen; one of them rode his wild, nervous horse
bareback, because it had bucked so when he tried to put
the saddle on it that morning that he feared he would
get left behind, and so abandoned the saddle outright.
Whenever they had a chance they all rode at headlong
speed, paying no heed to the slope of the mountain-side
or the character of the ground. In the deep snow they
did me a real service, for of course they had to ride
their horses single file through the drifts, and by the time
my turn came we had a good trail.
After a good deal of beating to and fro, we found
where an old she-bear with two yearlings had crossed a
hill during the night and put the hounds on their tracks.
Johnny and Jake, with one or two of the cowboys, fol-
lowed the hounds over the exceedingly difficult hillside
where the trail led; or rather, they tried to follow them,
for the hounds speedily got clear away, as there were
many places where they could run on the crust of the
snow, in which the horses wallowed almost helpless. The
A DOILY BEAR
From a photograph, copyright, 1905, by Alexander Lambert, M.D.
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT
91
rest of us went down to the valley, where the snow was
light and the going easier. The bear had travelled hither
and thither through the woods on the sidehill, and the
dogs became scattered. Moreover, they jumped sev-
eral deer, and four or five of the young dogs took after
one of the latter. Finally, however, the rest of the pack
put up the three bears. We had an interesting glimpse
of the chase as the bears quartered up across an open
spot of the hillside. The hounds were but a short distance
behind them, strung out in a long string, the more power-
ful, those which could do best in the snow-bucking, tak-
ing the lead. We pushed up the mountain-side after
them, horse after horse getting down in the snow, and
speedily heard the redoubled clamor which told us that
something had been treed. It was half an hour before
we could make our way to the tree, a spruce, in which
the two yearlings had taken refuge, while around the
bottom the entire pack was gathered, crazy with excite-
ment. We could not take the yearlings alive, both be-
cause we lacked the means of carrying them, and because
we were anxious to get after the old bear. We could
not leave them where they were, because it would have
been well-nigh impossible to get the dogs away, and be-
cause, even if we had succeeded in getting them away,
they would not have run any other trail as long as they
knew the yearlings were in the tree. It was therefore
out of the question to leave them unharmed, as we should
have been glad to do, and Lambert killed them both with
his revolver; the one that was first hit immediately biting
its brother. The ranchmen took them home to eat.
92 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
The hounds were Immediately put on the trail of the
old one and disappeared over the snow. In a few minutes
we followed. It was heavy work getting up the moun-
tain-side through the drifts, but once on top we made our
way down a nearly bare spur, and then turned to the
right, scrambled a couple of miles along a slippery side-
hill, and halted. Below us lay a great valley, on the
farther side of which a spruce forest stretched up toward
the treeless peaks. Snow covered even the bottom of the
valley, and lay deep and solid in the spruce forest on the
mountain-side. The hounds were in full cry, evidently
on a hot trail, and we caught glimpses of them far on the
opposite side of the valley, crossing little open glades in
the spruce timber. If the crust was hard they scattered
out. Where it was at all soft they ran in single file. We
worked our way down toward them, and on reaching the
bottom of the valley, went up it as fast as the snow would
allow. Finally we heard the pack again barking treed
and started toward them. They had treed the bear far
up the mountain-side in the thick spruce timber, and a
short experiment showed us that the horses could not
possibly get through the snow. Accordingly, off we
jumped and went toward the sound on foot, all the young
ranchmen and cowboys rushing ahead, and thereby again
making me an easy trail. On the way to the tree the rider
of the bareback horse pounced on a snowshoe rabbit
which was crouched under a bush and caught it with his
hands. It was half an hour before we reached the tree,
a big spruce, up which the bear had gone to a height of
some forty feet. I broke her neck with a single bullet.
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 93
She was smaller than the one I had shot the day before,
but full grown. In her stomach, as in those of the two
yearlings, there were buds of rose-bushes and quaking
aspens. One yearling had also swallowed a mouse. It
was a long ride to camp, and darkness had fallen by the
time we caught the gleam from the lighted tents, across
the dark stream.
With neither of these last two bear had there been any
call for prowess ; my part was merely to kill the bear dead
at the first shot, for the sake of the pack. But the days
were very enjoyable, nevertheless. It was good fun to
be twelve hours in the saddle in such wild and beautiful
country, to look at and listen to the hounds as they
worked, and finally to see the bear treed and looking
down at the maddened pack baying beneath.
For the next two or three days I was kept in camp
by a touch of Cuban fever. On one of these days Lam-
bert enjoyed the longest hunt we had on the trip, after
an old she-bear and three yearlings. The yearlings treed
one by one, each of course necessitating a stoppage, and
it was seven in the evening before the old bear at last went
up a Cottonwood and was shot; she was only wounded,
however, and in the fight she crippled Johnny's Rowdy
before she was killed. When the hunters reached camp
it was thirteen hours since they had left it. The old bear
was a very light brown; the first yearling was reddish-
brown, the second light yellowish-brown, the third dark
black-brown, though all were evidently of the same litter.
Following this came a spell of bad weather, snow-
storm and blizzard steadily succeeding one another.
94 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
This lasted until my holiday was over. Some days we
had to stay in camp. On other days we hunted ; but there
was three feet of new snow on the summits and foothills,
making it difficult to get about. We saw no more bear,
and, indeed, no more bear-tracks that were less than two
or three weeks old.
We killed a couple of bobcats. The chase of one was
marked by several incidents. We had been riding
through a blizzard on the top of a plateau, and were glad
to plunge down into a steep sheer-sided valley. By the
time we reached the bottom there was a lull in the storm
and we worked our way with considerable difficulty
through the snow, down timber, and lava rock, toward
Divide Creek. After ^ while the valley widened a little,
spruce and aspens fringing the stream at the bottom while
the sides were bare. Here we struck a fresh bobcat trail
leading off up one of the mountain-sides. The hounds
followed it nearly to the top, then turned and came down
again, worked through the timber in the bottom, and
struck out on the hillside opposite. Suddenly we saw the
bobcat running ahead of them and doubling and circling.
A few minutes afterward the hounds followed the trail
to the creek bottom and then began to bark treed. But
on reaching the point we found there was no cat in the
tree, although the dogs seemed certain that there was;
and Johnny and Jake speedily had them again running
on the trail. After making its way for some distance
through the bottom, the cat had again taken to the side-
hill, and the hounds went after it hard. Again they went
nearly to the top, again they streamed down to the bottom
THE BIG BEAR
From a photograph by Philip B. Stewart
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 95
and crossed the creek. Soon afterward we saw the cat
ahead of them. For the moment it threw them ofif the
track by making a circle and galloping around close to
the rearmost hounds. It then made for the creek bottom,
where it climbed to the top of a tall aspen. The hounds
soon picked up the trail again, and followed it full cry;
but unfortunately just before they reached where it had
treed they ran on to a porcupine. When we reached the
foot of the aspen, in the top of which the bobcat crouched,
with most of the pack baying beneath, we found the por-
cupine dead and half a dozen dogs with their muzzles
and throats filled full of quills. Before doing anything
with the cat it was necessary to take these quills out. One
of the terriers, which always found porcupines an irre-
sistible attraction, was a really extraordinary sight, so
thickly were the quills studded over his face and chest.
But a big hound was in even worse condition; the quills
were stuck in abundance into his nose, lips, cheeks, and
tongue, and in the roof of his mouth they were almost
as thick as bristles in a brush. Only by use of pincers was
it possible to rid these two dogs of the quills, and it was
a long and bloody job. The others had suffered less.
The dogs seemed to have no sympathy with one an-
other, and apparently all that the rest of the pack felt was
that they were kept a long time waiting for the cat. They
never stopped baying for a minute, and Shorty, as was his
habit, deliberately bit great patches of bark from the
aspens, to show his impatience; for the tree in which the
cat stood was not one which he could climb. After at-
tending to the porcupine dogs one of the men climbed
96 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the tree and with a stick pushed out the cat. It dropped
down through the branches forty or fifty feet, but was so
quick in starting and dodging that it actually rushed
through the pack, crossed the stream, and, doubling and
twisting, was off up the creek through the timber. It
ran cunning, and in a minute or two lay down under a
bush and watched the hounds as they went by, overrun-
ning its trail. Then it took off up the hillside; but the
hounds speedily picked up its track, and running in single
file, were almost on it. Then the cat turned down hill,
but too late, for it was overtaken within fifty yards. This
ended our hunting.
One Sunday we rode down some six miles from camp
to a little blue school-house and attended service. The
preacher was in the habit of riding over every alternate
Sunday from Rifle, a little town twenty or twenty-five
miles away; and the ranchmen with their wives and chil-
dren, some on horseback, some in wagons, had gathered
from thirty miles round to attend the service. The crowd
was so large that the exercises had to take place in the
open air, and it was pleasant to look at the strong frames
and rugged, weather-beaten faces of the men ; while as
for the women, one respected them even more than the
men.
In spite of the snow-storms spring was coming; some
of the trees were beginning to bud and show green, more
and more flowers were in bloom, and bird life was stead-
ily increasing. In the bushes by the streams the hand-
some white-crowned sparrows and green-tailed towhees
were in full song, making attractive music ; although the
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 97
song of neither can rightly be compared in point of
plaintive beauty with that of the white-throated sparrow,
which, except some of the thrushes, and perhaps the win-
ter wren, is the sweetest singer of the Northeastern forests.
The spurred towhees were very plentiful ; and one morn-
ing a willow-thrush sang among the willows like a veery.
Both the crested jays and the Woodhouse jays came
around camp. Lower down the Western meadow larks
were singing beautifully, and vesper finches were abun-
dant. Say's flycatcher, a very attractive bird, with pretty,
soft-colored plumage, continually uttering a plaintive
single note, and sometimes a warbling twitter, flitted
about in the neighborhood of the little log ranch houses.
Gangs of blackbirds visited the corrals. I saw but one
song sparrow, and curiously enough, though I think it
was merely an individual peculiarity, this particular bird
had a song entirely different from any I have heard from
the familiar Eastern bird — always a favorite of mine.
While up in the mountains hunting, we twice came
upon owls, which were rearing their families in the de-
serted nests of the red-tailed hawk. One was a long-eared
owl, and the other a great horned owl, of the pale Western
variety. Both were astonishingly tame, and we found it
difficult to make them leave their nests, which were in
the tops of Cottonwood trees.
On the last day we rode down to where Glenwood
Springs lies, hemmed in by lofty mountain chains, which
are riven in sunder by sheer-sided, cliff-walled canyons.
As we left ever farther behind us the wintry desolation
of our high hunting grounds we rode into full spring.
98 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
The green of the valley was a delight to the eye; bird
songs sounded on every side, from the fields and from the
trees and bushes beside the brooks and irrigation ditches;
the air was sweet with the spring-time breath of many
budding things. The sarvice bushes were white with
bloom, like shadblow on the Hudson; the blossoms of the
Oregon grape made yellow mats on the ground. We saw
the chunky Say's ground squirrel, looking like a big chip-
munk, with on each side a conspicuous white stripe edged
with black. In one place we saw quite a large squirrel,
grayish, with red on the lower back. I suppose it was
only a pine squirrel, but it looked like one of the gray
squirrels of southern Colorado. Mountain mockers and
the handsome, bold Arkansaw king birds were numerous.
The black-tail sage sparrow was conspicuous in the sage-
brush, and high among the cliffs the white-throated swifts
were soaring. There were numerous warblers, among
which I could only make out the black-throated gray,
Audubon's, and McGillivray's. In Glenwood Springs
itself the purple finches, house finches, and Bullock's
orioles were in full song. Flocks of siskins passed with
dipping flight. In one rapid little stream we saw a water
ousel. Humming-birds — I suppose the broad-tailed —
were common, and as they flew they made, intermittently
and almost rhythmically, a curious metallic sound; seem-
ingly it was done with their wings.
But the thing that interested me most in the way of
bird life was something I saw in Denver. To my delight
I found that the huge hotel at which we took dinner was
monopolized by the pretty, musical house finches, to the
A COLORADO BEAR HUNT
99
exclusion of the ordinary city sparrows. The latter are
all too plentiful in Denver, as in every other city, and,
as always, are noisy, quarrelsome — in short, thoroughly
unattractive and disreputable. The house finch, on the
contrary, is attractive in looks, in song, and in ways. It
was delightful to hear the males singing, often on the
wing. They went right up to the top stories of the high
hotel, and nested under the eaves and in the cornices.
The cities of the Southwestern States are to be con-
gratulated on having this spirited, attractive little song-
ster as a familiar dweller around their houses and in
their gardens.
CHAPTER III
WOLF-COURSING
On April eighth, nineteen hundred and five, we left
the town of Frederick, Oklahoma, for a few days' coyote
coursing in the Comanche Reserve. Lieut. -Gen. S. B.
M. Young, U. S. A., retired. Lieutenant Fortescue, U.
S. A., formerly of my regiment, and Dr. Alexander
Lambert, of New York, were with me. We were the
guests of Colonel Cecil Lyon, of Texas, of Sloan Simp-
son, also of TexavS, and formerly of my regiment, and
of two old-style Texas cattlemen, Messrs. Burnett
and Wagner, who had leased great stretches of wire-
fenced pasture from the Comanches and Kiowas; and
I cannot sufficiently express my appreciation of the
kindness of these my hosts. Burnett's brand, the
Four Sixes, has been owned by him for forty years.
Both of them had come to this country thirty years
before, in the days of the buffalo, when all game was
very plentiful and the Indians were still on the war-
path. Several other ranchmen were along, including
John Abernethy, of Tesca, Oklahoma, a professional
wolf hunter. There were also a number of cow-
hands of both Burnett and Wagner; among them were
two former riders for the Four Sixes, Fi Taylor and
Uncle Ed Gillis, who seemed to make it their special
mission to see that everything went right with me.
I
WOLF-COURSING loi
Furthermore there was Captain McDonald of the Texas
Rangers, a game and true man, whose name was one of
terror to outlaws and violent criminals of all kinds; and
finally there was Quanah Parker, the Comanche chief,
in his youth a bitter foe of the whites, now painfully
teaching his people to travel the white man's stony road.
We drove out some twenty miles to where camp was
pitched in a bend of Deep Red Creek, which empties
into the Red River of the South. Cottonwood, elm, and
pecans formed a belt of timber along the creek; we had
good water, the tents were pitched on short, thick grass,
and everything was in perfect order. The fare was de-
licious. Altogether it was an ideal camp, and the days
we passed there were also ideal. Cardinals and mocking-
birds — the most individual and delightful of all birds in
voice and manner — sang in the woods ; and the beautiful,
many-tinted fork-tailed fly-catchers were to be seen now
and then, perched in trees or soaring in curious zigzags,
chattering loudly.
In chasing the coyote only greyhounds are used, and
half a dozen different sets of these had been brought to
camp. Those of Wagner, the " Big D " dogs, as his cow-
punchers called them, were handled by Bony Moore,
who, with Tom Burnett, the son of our host Burke Bur-
nett, took the lead in feats of daring horsemanship, even
in that field of daring horsemen. Bevins had brought
both greyhounds and rough-haired staghounds from his
Texas ranch. So had Cecil Lyon, and though his dogs
had chiefly been used in coursing the black-tailed Texas
jack-rabbit, they took naturally to the coyote chases.
I02 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
Finally there were Abernethy's dogs, which, together with
their master, performed the feats I shall hereafter relate.
Abernethy has a homestead of his own not far from Fred-
erick, and later I was introduced to his father, an old
Confederate soldier, and to his sweet and pretty wife, and
their five little children. He had run away with his wife
when they were nineteen and sixteen respectively; but the
match had turned out a happy one. Both were partic-
ularly fond of music, including the piano, horn, and vio-
lin, and they played duets together. General Young,
whom the Comanches called " War Bonnet," went in a
buggy with Burke Burnett, and as Burnett invariably
followed the hounds at full speed in his buggy, and
usually succeeded in seeing most of the chase, I felt that
the buggy men really encountered greater hazards than
anyone else. It was a thoroughly congenial company all
through. The weather was good; we were in the saddle
from morning until night; and our camp was in all re-
spects all that a camp should be; so how could we help
enjoying ourselves?
The coursing was done on the flats and great rolling
prairies which stretched north from our camp toward the
Wichita Mountains and south toward the Red River.
There was a certain element of risk in the gallops, be-
cause the whole country was one huge prairie-dog town,
the prairie-dogs being so numerous that the new towns
and the abandoned towns were continuous with one
another in every direction. Practically every run we
had was through these prairie-dog towns, varied occa-
sionally by creeks and washouts. But as we always ran
WOLF-COURSING
103
scattered out, the wonderfully quick cow-ponies, brought
up in this country and spending all their time among the
prairie-dog towns, were able, even while running at
headlong speed, to avoid the holes with a cleverness that
was simply marvellous. During our hunt but one horse
stepped in a hole; he turned a complete somerset, though
neither he nor his rider was hurt. Stunted mesquite
bushes grew here and there in the grass, and there was
cactus. As always in prairie-dog towns, there were bur-
rowing owls and rattlesnakes. We had to be on our
guard that the dogs did not attack the latter. Once we
thought a greyhound was certainly bitten. It was a very
fast blue bitch, which seized the rattler and literally
shook it to pieces. The rattler struck twice at the bitch,
but so quick were the bitch's movements that she was not
hit either time, and in a second the snake was not merely
dead, but in pieces. We usually killed the rattlers with
either our quirts or ropes. One which I thus killed was
over five feet long.
By rights there ought to have been carts in which the
greyhounds could be drawn until the coyotes were sighted,
but there were none, and the greyhounds simply trotted
along beside the horses. All of them were fine animals,
and almost all of them of recorded pedigree. Coyotes
have sharp teeth and bite hard, while greyhounds have
thin skins, and many of them were cut in the worries.
This was due to the fact that only two or three of them
seized by the throat, the others taking hold behind, which
of course exposed them to retaliation. Few of them
would have been of much use in stopping a big wolf.
I04 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
Abernethy's hounds, however, though they could not kill
a big wolf, would stop it, permitting their owner to seize
it exactly as he seized coyotes, as hereafter described.
He had killed but a few of the big gray wolves; one
weighed ninety-seven pounds. He said that there were
gradations from this down to the coyotes. A few days
before our arrival, after a very long chase, he had cap-
tured a black wolf, weighing between fifty and sixty
pounds.
These Southern coyotes or prairie-wolves are only
about one-third the size of the big gray timber wolves of
the Northern Rockies. They are too small to meddle
with full-grown horses and cattle, but pick up young
calves and kill sheep, as well as any small domesticated
animal that they can get at. The big wolves flee from
the neighborhood of anything like close settlements, but
coyotes hang around the neighborhood of man much more
persistently. They show a fox-like cunning in catching
rabbits, prairie-dogs, gophers, and the like. After night-
fall they are noisy, and their melancholy wailing and yell-
ing are familiar sounds to all who pass over the plains.
The young are brought forth in holes in cut banks or
similar localities. Within my own experience I have
known of the finding of but two families. In one there
was but a single family of five cubs and one old animal,
undoubtedly the mother; in the other case there were ten
or eleven cubs and two old females which had apparently
shared the burrow or cave, though living in separate
pockets. In neither case was any full-grown male coyote
found in the neighborhood; as regards these particular
WOLF-COURSING
105
litters, the father seemingly had nothing to do with tak-
ing care of or supporting the family. I am not able to
say whether this was accidental or whether it is a rule,
that only the mother lives with and takes care of the lit-
ter; I have heard contrary statements about the matter
from hunters who should know. Unfortunately I have
learned from long experience that it is only exceptional
hunters who can be trusted to give accurate descriptions
of the habits of any beast, save such as are connected with
its chase.
Coyotes are sharp, wary, knowing creatures, and on
most occasions take care to keep out of harm's way. But
individuals among them have queer freaks. On one oc-
casion while Sloan Simpson was on the round-up he
waked at night to find something on the foot of his
bed, its dark form indistinctly visible against the white
tarpaulin. He aroused a friend to ask if it could be a
dog. While they were cautiously endeavoring to find out
what it was, it jumped up and ran off; they then saw that
it was a coyote. In a short time it returned again, coming
out of the darkness toward one of the cowboys who
was awake, and the latter shot it, fearing it might have
hydrophobia. But I doubt this, as in such case it would
not have curled up and gone to sleep on Simpson's bed-
ding. Coyotes are subject to hydrophobia, and when
under the spell of the dreadful disease will fearlessly at-
tack men. In one case of which I know, a mad coyote
coming into camp sprang on a sleeping man who was
rolled in his bedding and bit and worried the bedding in
the effort to get at him. Two other men hastened to his
io6 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
rescue, and the coyote first attacked them and then sud-
denly sprang aside and again worried the bedding, by
which time one of them was able to get in a shot and
killed it. All coyotes, like big wolves, die silently and
fight to the last. I had never weighed any coyotes until
on this trip. I weighed the twelve which I myself saw
caught, and they ran as follows: male, thirty pounds;
female, twenty-eight pounds; female, thirty-six pounds;
male, thirty-two pounds; male, thirty-four pounds; fe-
male, thirty pounds; female, twenty-seven pounds; male,
thirty-two pounds; male, twenty-nine pounds; young
male, twenty-two pounds; male, twenty-nine pounds; fe-
male, twenty-seven pounds. Disregarding the young
male, this makes an average of just over thirty pounds.^
Except the heaviest female, they were all gaunt and in
splendid running trim; but then I do not remember ever
seeing a really fat coyote.
The morning of the first day of our hunt dawned
bright and beautiful, the air just cool enough to be pleas-
ant. Immediately after breakfast we jogged ofif on horse-
back, Tom Burnett and Bony Moore in front, with six or
eight greyhounds slouching alongside, while Burke Bur-
nett and " War Bonnet " drove behind us in the buggy.
I was mounted on one of Tom Burnett's favorites, a beau-
tiful Kiowa pony. The chuck wagon, together with the
1 I sent the skins and skulls to Dr. Hart Merriam, the head of the Bio-
logical Survey. He wrote me about them : ** All but one are the plains coyote,
Canis nebracensis. They are not perfectly typical, but are near enough for all
practical purposes. The exception is a yearling pup of a much larger species.
Whether this is fr us tor I dare not say in the present state of knowledge of the
group."
WOLF-COURSING 107
relay of greyhounds to be used in the afternoon, was to
join us about midday at an appointed place where there
was a pool of water.
We shuffled along, strung out in an irregular line,
across a long flat, in places covered with bright-green
wild onions; and then up a gentle slope where the stunted
mesquite grew, while the prairie-dogs barked spasmod-
ically as we passed their burrows. The low crest, if such
it could be called, of the slope was reached only some
twenty minutes after we left camp, and hardly had we
started down the other side than two coyotes were spied
three or four hundred yards in front. Immediately
horses and dogs were after them at a headlong, breakneck
run, the coyotes edging to the left where the creek bot-
tom, with its deep banks and narrow fringes of timber,
was about a mile distant. The little wolves knew their
danger and ran their very fastest, while the long dogs
stretched out after them, gaining steadily. It was evident
the chase would be a short one, and there was no need to
husband the horses, so every man let his pony go for
all there was in him. At such a speed, and especially
going down hill, there was not the slightest use in trying
to steer clear of the prairie-dog holes; it was best to let
the veteran cow-ponies see to that for themselves. They
were as eager as their riders, and on we dashed at full
speed, curving to the left toward the foot of the slope;
we jumped into and out of a couple of broad, shallow
washouts, as we tore after the hounds, now nearing their
quarry. The rearmost coyote was overtaken just at the
edge of the creek; the foremost, which was a few yards
io8 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
in advance, made good its escape, as all the dogs promptly
tackled the rearmost, tumbling it over into a rather deep
pool. The scuffling and splashing told us what was going
on, and we reined our horses short up at the brink of
the cut bank. The water had hampered the dogs in kill-
ing their quarry, only three or four of them being in the
pool with him; and of those he had seized one by the
nose and was hanging on hard. In a moment one of the
cowboys got hold of him, dropped a noose over his head,
and dragged him out on the bank, just as the buggy came
rattling up at full gallop. Burnett and the general, tak-
ing advantage of the curve in our course, had driven
across the chord of the arc, and keeping their horses at a
run, had seen every detail of the chase and were in at the
death.
In a few minutes the coyote was skinned, the dogs
rested, and we were jogging on once more. Hour after
hour passed by. We had a couple more runs, but in each
case the coyote had altogether too long a start and got
away; the dogs no longer being as fresh as they had been.
As a rule, although there are exceptions, if the grey-
hounds cannot catch the coyote within two or three miles
the chances favor the escape of the little wolf. We found
that if the wolf had more than half a mile start he got
away. As greyhounds hunt by sight, cut banks enable the
coyote easily to throw off his pursuers unless they are
fairly close up. The greyhounds see the wolf when he is
far ofT, for they have good eyes; but in the chase, if the
going is irregular, they tend to lose him, and they do not
depend much on one another in recovering sight of him;
3 o
;— p
WOLF-COURSING 109
on the contrary, the dog is apt to quit when he no longer
has the quarry in view.
At noon we joined the chuck wagon where it stood
drawn up on a slope of the treeless, bushless prairie; and
the active round-up cook soon had the meal ready. It
was the Four Sixes wagon, the brand burned into the
wood of the chuck box. Where does a man take more
frank enjoyment in his dinner than at the tail end of a
chuck wagon?
Soon after eating we started again, having changed
horses and dogs. I was mounted on a Big D cow pony,
while Lambert had a dun-colored horse, hard to hold,
but very tough and swift. An hour or so after leaving
camp we had a four-mile run after a coyote, which finally
got away, for it had so long a start that the dogs were
done out by the time they came within fair distance.
They stopped at a little prairie pool, some of them lying
or standing in it, panting violently; and thus we found
them as we came stringing up at a gallop. After they
had been well rested we started toward camp; but we
were down in the creek bottom before we saw another
coyote. This one again was a long distance ahead, and
I did not suppose there was much chance of our catching
him; but away all the dogs and all the riders went at
the usual run, and catch him we did, because, as it turned
out, the " morning " dogs, which were with the wagon,
had spied him first and run him hard, until he was in
sight of the " afternoon " dogs, which were with us. I
got tangled in a washout, scrambled out, and was gallop-
ing along, watching the country in front, when Lambert
no AN AMERICAN HUNTER
passed me as hard as he could go; I saw him disappear
into another washout, and then come out on the other
side, while the dogs were driving the coyote at an angle
down toward the creek. Pulling short to the right, I got
through the creek, hoping the coyote would cross, and the
result was that I galloped up to the worry almost as soon
as the foremost riders from the other side — a piece of
good fortune for which I had only luck to thank. The
hounds caught the coyote as he was about crossing the
creek. From this point it was but a short distance into
camp.
Again next morning we were ofif before the sun had
risen high enough to take away the cool freshness from
the air. This day we travelled several miles before we
saw our first coyote. It was on a huge, gently sloping
stretch of prairie, which ran down to the creek on our
right. We were travelling across it strung out in line
when the coyote sprang up a good distance ahead of the
dogs. They ran straight away from us at first. Then I
saw the coyote swinging to the right toward the creek
and I half-wheeled, riding diagonally to the line of the
chase. This gave me an excellent view of dogs and wolf,
and also enabled me to keep nearly abreast of them. On
this particular morning the dogs were Bevin's grey-
hounds and staghounds. From where the dogs started
they ran about three miles, catching their quarry in the
flat where the creek circled around in a bend, and when
it was not fifty yards from the timber. By this time the
puncher. Bony Moore, had passed me, most of the other
riders having been so far to the left when the run began
WOLF-COURSING 1 1 1
that they were unable to catch up. The little wolf ran
well, and the greyhounds had about reached their limit
when they caught up with it. But they lasted just long
enough to do the work. A fawn-colored greyhound and
a black staghound were the first dogs up. The stag-
hound tried to seize the coyote, which dodged a little to
one side; the fawn-colored greyhound struck and threw
it; and in another moment the other dogs were up and
the worry began. I was able to see the run so well, be-
cause Tom Burnett had mounted me on his fine roan
cutting horse. We sat around in a semicircle on the grass
until the dogs had been breathed, and then started off
again. After some time we struck another coyote, but
rather far off, and this time the dogs were not fresh.
After running two or three miles he pulled away and we
lost him, the dogs refreshing themselves by standing and
lying in a shallow prairie pool.
In the afternoon we again rode off, and this time Ab-
ernethy, on his white horse, took the lead, his greyhounds
trotting beside him. There was a good deal of rivalry
among the various owners of the hounds as to which could
do best, and a slight inclination among the cowboys to
be jealous of Abernethy. No better riders could be im-
agined than these same cowboys, and their greyhounds
were stanch and fast; but Abernethy, on his tough white
horse, not only rode with great judgment, but showed
a perfect knowledge of the coyote, and by his own ex-
ertions greatly assisted his hounds. He had found out
in his long experience that while the greyhounds could
outpace a coyote in a two or three mile run, they would
112 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
then fall behind; but that after going eight or ten miles,
a coyote in turn became exhausted, and if he had been
able to keep his hounds going until that time, they could,
with his assistance, then stop the quarry.
We had been shogging along for an hour or more
when we put up a coyote and started after it. I was rid-
ing the Big D pony I had ridden the afternoon before.
It was a good and stout horse, but one which my weight
was certain to distress if I tried to go too fast for too
long a time. Moreover, the coyote had a long start, and
I made up my mind that he would either get away or
give us a hard run. Accordingly, as the cowboys started
off at their usual headlong pace, I rode behind at a gal-
lop, husbanding my horse. For a mile or so the going
was very rough, up over and down stony hills and among
washouts. Then we went over gently rolling country
for another mile or two, and then came to a long broken
incline which swept up to a divide some four miles ahead
of us. Lambert had been riding alongside of Abernethy,
at the front, but his horse began to play out, and needed
to be nursed along, so that he dropped back level with
me. By the time I had reached the foot of this incline
the punchers, riding at full speed, had shot their bolts,
and one by one I passed them, as well as most of the
greyhounds. But Abernethy was far ahead, his white
horse loping along without showing any signs of distress.
Up the long slope I did not dare press my animal, and
Abernethy must have been a mile ahead of me when he
struck the divide, while where the others were I had no
idea, except that they were behind me. When I reached
THE BIG D. COW PONY
From a photograph by W. Sloan Simpson
WOLF-COURSING 113
the divide I was afraid I might have missed Abernethy,
but to my delight he was still in sight, far ahead. As
we began to go down hill I let the horse fairly race; for
by Abernethy's motions I could tell that he was close to
the wolf and that it was no longer running in a straight
line, so that there was a chance of my overtaking them.
In a couple of miles I was close enough to see what was
going on. But one greyhound was left with Abernethy.
The coyote was obviously tired, and Abernethy, with the
aid of his perfectly trained horse, was helping the grey-
hound catch it. Twice he headed it, and this enabled
me to gain rapidly. They had reached a small unwooded
creek by the time I was within fifty yards; the little wolf
tried to break back to the left; Abernethy headed it and
rode almost over it, and it gave a wicked snap at his
foot, cutting the boot. Then he wheeled and came tow-
ard it; again it galloped back, and just as it crossed the
creek the greyhound made a rush, pinned it by the hind
leg and threw it. There was a scuffle, then a yell from
the greyhound as the wolf bit it. At the bite the hound
let go and jumped back a few feet, and at the same mo-
ment Abernethy, who had ridden his horse right on them
as they struggled, leaped off and sprang on top of the
wolf. He held the reins of the horse with one hand and
thrust the other, with a rapidity and precision even
greater than the rapidity of the wolf's snap, into the wolf's
mouth, jamming his hand down crosswise between the
jaws, seizing the lower jaw and bending it down so that
the wolf could not bite him. He had a stout glove on his
hand, but this would have been of no avail whatever had
114 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
he not seized the animal just as he did; that is, behind the
canines, while his hand pressed the lips against the teeth;
with his knees he kept the wolf from using its forepaws
to break the hold, until it gave up struggling. When he
thus leaped on and captured this coyote it was entirely-
free, the dog having let go of it; and he was obliged to
keep hold of the reins of his horse with one hand. I was
not twenty yards distant at the time, and as I leaped off
the horse he was sitting placidly on the live wolf, his
hand between its jaws, the greyhound standing beside
him, and his horse standing by as placid as he was. In
a couple of minutes Fortescue and Lambert came up. It
was as remarkable a feat of the kind as I have ever seen.
Through some oversight we had no straps with us,
and Abernethy had lost the wire which he usually carried
in order to tie up the wolves' muzzles — for he habitually
captured his wolves in this fashion. However, Abernethy
regarded the lack of straps as nothing more than a slight
bother. Asking one of us to hold his horse, he threw
the wolf across in front of the saddle, still keeping his
grip on the lower jaw, then mounted and rode ofif with
us on the back track. The wolf was not tied in any way.
It was unhurt, and the only hold he had was on its lower
jaw. I was surprised that it did not strive to fight with
its legs, but after becoming satisfied that it could not bite,
it seemed to resign itself to its fate, was fairly quiet, and
looked about with its ears pricked forward. The wolves
which I subsequently saw him capture, and, having tied
up their muzzles, hold before him on the saddle, acted
in precisely the same manner.
WOLF-COURSING 115
The run had been about ten miles in an almost
straight line. At the finish no other riders were in sight,
but soon after we crossed the divide on our return, and
began to come down the long slope toward the creek, we
were joined by Tom Burnett and Bony Moore; while
some three or four miles ahead on a rise of the prairie
we could see the wagon in which Burke Burnett was driv-
ing General Young. Other punchers and straggling
greyhounds joined us, and as the wolf, after travelling
some five miles, began to recover his wind and show a
tendency to fight for his freedom, Abernethy tied up his
jaws with his handkerchief and handed him over to Bony
Moore, who packed him on the saddle with entire indif-
ference, the wolf himself showing a curious philosophy.
Our horses had recovered their wind and we struck into
a gallop down the slope; then as we neared the wagon
we broke into a run. Bony Moore brandishing aloft with
one hand the live wolf, its jaws tied up with a handker-
chief, but otherwise unbound. We stopped for a few
minutes with Burnett and the general to tell particulars
of the hunt. Then we loped off again toward camp,
which was some half dozen miles ofif. I shall always
remember this run and the really remarkable feat Aber-
nethy performed. Colonel Lyon had seen him catch a
big wolf in the same way that he caught this coyote. It
was his usual method of catching both coyotes and wolves.
Almost equally noteworthy were the way in which he
handled and helped his greyhounds, and the judgment,
resolution, and fine horsemanship he displayed. His
horse showed extraordinary endurance.
ii6 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
The third day we started out as usual, the chuck
wagon driving straight to a pool far out on the prairie,
where we were to meet it for lunch. Chief Quanah's
three wives had joined him, together with a small boy
and a baby, and they drove in a wagon of their own.
Meanwhile the riders and hounds went south nearly to
Red River. In the morning we caught four coyotes and
had a three miles run after one which started too far
ahead of the dogs, and finally got clean away. All the
four that we got were started fairly close up, and the run
was a breakneck scurry, horses and hounds going as hard
as they could put feet to the ground. Twice the cowboys
distanced me; and twice the accidents of the chase, the
sudden twists and turns of the coyote in his efforts to take
advantage of the ground, favored me and enabled me to
be close up at the end, when Abernethy jumped ofif his
horse and ran in to where the dogs had the coyote.
He was even quicker with his hands than the wolf's
snap, and in a moment he always had the coyote by the
lower jaw.
Between the runs we shogged forward across the great
reaches of rolling prairie in the bright sunlight. The air
was wonderfully clear, and any object on the sky-line, no
matter how small, stood out with startling distinctness.
There were few flowers on these dry plains; in sharp con-
trast to the flower prairies of southern Texas, which we
had left the week before, where many acres for a stretch
would be covered by masses of red or white or blue or yel-
low blossoms — the most striking of all, perhaps, being the
fields of the handsome buffalo clover. As we plodded
ABERNETHY AND COYOTE
From a photograph, copyright, 190s, by Alexander Lambert, M.D.
WOLF-COURSING 117
over the prairie the sharp eyes of the punchers were scan-
ning the ground far and near, and sooner or later one of
them would spy the motionless form of a coyote, or all
would have their attention attracted as it ran like a fleet-
ing gray or brown shadow among the grays and browns of
the desolate landscape. Immediately dogs and horses
would stretch at full speed after it, and everything would
be forgotten but the wild exhilaration of the run.
It was nearly noon when we struck the chuck wagon.
Immediately the handy round-up cook began to prepare
a delicious dinner, and we ate as men have a right to eat,
who have ridden all the morning and are going to ride
fresh horses all the afternoon. Soon afterward the horse-
wranglers drove up the saddle band, while some of the
cow-punchers made a rope corral from the side of the
wagon. Into this the horses were driven, one or two
breaking back and being brought into the bunch again
only after a gallop more exciting than most coyote chases.
Fresh ponies were roped out and the saddle band again
turned loose. The dogs that had been used during the
morning then started campward with the chuck wagon.
One of the punchers was riding a young and partially
broken horse; he had no bridle, simply a rope around the
horse's neck. This man started to accompany the wagon
to the camp.
The rest of us went ofif at the usual cow-pony trot or
running walk. It was an hour or two before we saw any-
thing; then a coyote appeared a long way ahead and the
dogs raced after him. The first mile was up a gentle
slope ; then we turned, and after riding a couple of miles
ii8 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
on the level the dogs had shot their bolt and the coyote
drew away. When he got too far in front the dogs and
foremost riders stopped and waited for the rest of us to
overtake them, and shortly afterward Burke Burnett and
the general appeared in their buggy. One of the grey-
hounds was completely done out and we took some time
attending to it. Suddenly one of the men, either Tom
Burnett or Bony Moore, called out that he saw the coyote
coming back pursued by a horseman. Sure enough, the
unfortunate little wolf had run in sight of the wagons,
and the puncher on the young unbridled horse immedi-
ately took after him, and, in spite of a fall, succeeded in
heading him back and bringing him along in our direc-
tion, although some three-quarters of a mile away. Im-
mediately everyone jumped into his saddle and away we
all streamed down a long slope diagonally to the course
the coyote was taking. He had a long start, but the dogs
were rested, while he had been running steadily, and this
fact proved fatal to him. Down the slope to the creek
bottom at its end we rode at a run. Then there came a
long slope upward, and the heavier among us fell gradu-
ally to the rear. When we topped the divide, however,
we could see ahead of us the foremost men streaming
after the hounds, and the latter running in a way which
showed that they were well up on their game. Even a
tired horse can go pretty well down hill, and by dint of
hard running we who were behind got up in time to see
the worry when the greyhounds caught the coyote, by
some low ponds in a treeless creek-bed. We had gone
about seven miles, the unlucky coyote at least ten. Our
WOLF-COURSING 119
journey to camp was enlivened by catching another
coyote after a short run.
Next day was the last of our hunt. We started off in
the morning as usual, but the buggy men on this occasion
took with them some trail hounds, which were managed
by a sergeant of the regular army, a game sportsman.
They caught tw^o coons in the timber of a creek two or
three miles to the south of the camp. Meanwhile the
rest of us, riding over the prairie, saw the greyhounds
catch two coyotes, one after a rather long run and one
after a short one. Then we turned our faces toward
camp. I saw Abernethy, with three or four of his own
hounds, riding off to one side, but unfortunately I did
not pay any heed to him, as I supposed the hunting was
at an end. But when we reached camp Abernethy was
not there, nor did he turn up until we were finishing
lunch. Then he suddenly appeared, his tired greyhounds
trotting behind him, while he carried before him on the
saddle a live coyote, with its muzzle tied up, and a dead
coyote strapped behind his saddle. Soon after leaving
us he had found a coyote, and after a good run the dogs
had stopped it and he had jumped off and captured it in
his usual fashion. Then while riding along, holding the
coyote before him on the saddle, he put up another one.
His dogs were tired, and he himself was of course greatly
hampered in such a full-speed run by having the live
wolf on the saddle in front of him. One by one the dogs
gave out, but his encouragement and assistance kept two
of them to their work, and after a run of some seven miles
the coyote was overtaken. It was completely done out
I20 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
and would probably have died by itself, even if the hounds
had not taken part in the killing. Hampered as he was,
Abernethy could not take it alive in his usual fashion.
So when it was dead he packed it behind his horse and
rode back in triumph. The live wolf, as in every other
case where one was brought into camp, made curiously
little effort to fight with its paws, seeming to acquiesce in
its captivity, and looking around, with its ears thrust for-
ward, as if more influenced by curiosity than by any other
feeling.
After lunch we rode toward town, stopping at night-
fall to take supper by the bank of a creek. We entered
the town after dark, some twenty of us on horseback.
Wagner was riding with us, and he had set his heart
upon coming into and through the town in true cowboy
style; and it was he who set the pace. We broke into a
lope a mile outside the limits, and by the time we struck
the main street the horses were on a run and we tore down
like a whirlwind until we reached the train. Thus ended
as pleasant a hunting trip as any one could imagine. The
party got seventeen coyotes all told, for there were some
runs which I did not see at all, as now and then both
men and dogs would get split into groups.
On this hunt we did not see any of the big wolves, the
so-called buffalo or timber wolves, which I hunted in the
old days on the Northern cattle plains. Big wolves are
found in both Texas and Oklahoma, but they are rare
compared to the coyotes; and they are great wanderers.
Alone or in parties of three or four or half a dozen they
travel to and fro across the country, often leaving a dis-
WOLF-COURSING 121
trict at once if they are molested. Coyotes are more or
less plentiful everywhere throughout the West in thinly
settled districts, and they often hang about in the
immediate neighborhood of towns. They do enough
damage to make farmers and ranchers kill them when-
ever the chance offers. But this damage is not appreci-
able when compared with the ravages of their grim big
brother, the gray wolf, which, wherever it exists in num-
bers, is a veritable scourge to the stockmen.
Colonel Lyon's hounds were, as I have said, used
chiefly after jack-rabbits. He had frequently killed coy-
otes with them, however, and on two or three occasions
one of the big gray wolves. At the time when he did
most of his wolf-hunting he had with the greyhounds a
huge fighting dog, a Great Dane, weighing one hundred
and forty-five pounds. In spite of its weight this dog
could keep up well in a short chase, and its ferocious tem-
per and enormous weight and strength made it invaluable
at the bay. Whether the quarry were a gray wolf or
coyote mattered not in the least to it, and it made its
assaults with such headlong fury that it generally escaped
damage. On the two or three occasions when the animal
bayed was a big wolf the greyhounds did not dare tackle
it, jumping about in an irregular circle and threatening
the wolf until the fighting dog came up. The latter at
once rushed in, seizing its antagonist by the throat or
neck and throwing it. Doubtless it would have killed
the wolf unassisted, but the greyhounds always joined in
the killing; and once thrown, the wolf could never get
on his legs. In these encounters the dog was never seri-
122 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
ously hurt. Rather curiously, the only bad wound it ever
received was from a coyote; the little wolf, not one-third
of its weight, managing to inflict a terrific gash down its
huge antagonist's chest, nearly tearing it open. But of
course a coyote against such a foe could not last much
longer than a rat pitted against a terrier.
Big wolves and coyotes are found side by side
throughout the Western United States, both varying so
in size that if a sufficient number of specimens, from dif-
ferent localities, are examined it will be found that there
is a complete intergradation in both stature and weight.
To the northward the coyotes disappear, and the big
wolves grow larger and larger until in the arctic regions
they become veritable giants. At Point Barrow Mr. E.
A. Mcllhenny had six of the eight " huskies " of his dog
team killed and eaten by a huge white dog wolf. At last
he shot it, and found that it weighed one hundred and
sixty-one pounds.
Good trail hounds can run down a wolf. A year ago
Jake Borah's pack in northwestern Colorado ran a big
wolf weighing one hundred and fifteen pounds to bay in
but little over an hour. He then stood with his back to a
rock, and though the dogs formed a semicircle around
him, they dared not tackle him. Jake got up and shot him.
Unless well trained and with the natural fighting edge
neither trail hounds (fox-hounds) nor greyhounds can
or will kill a big wolf, and under ordinary circumstances,
no matter how numerous, they make but a poor showing
against one. But big ninety-pound or one hundred-
pound greyhounds, specially bred and trained for the
WOLF-COURSING 123
purpose, stand on an entirely different footing. Three
or four of these dogs, rushing in together and seizing the
wolf by the throat, will kill him, or worry him until he
is helpless. On several occasions the Colorado Springs
greyhounds have performed this feat. Johnny Goff
owned a large, fierce dog, a cross between what he called
a Siberian bloodhound (I suppose some animal like a
Great Dane) and an ordinary hound, which, on one occa-
sion when he had shot at and broken the hind leg of a big
wolf, ran it down and killed it. On the other hand, wolves
will often attack dogs. In March of the present year —
nineteen hundred and five — Goff's dogs were scattered
over a hillside hunting a bobcat, when he heard one of
them yell, and looking up saw that two wolves were chas-
ing it. The other dogs were so busy puzzling out the
cat's trail that they never noticed what was happening.
Goff called aloud, whereupon the wolves stopped. He
shot one and the other escaped. He thinks that they
would have overtaken and killed the hound in a minute
or two if he had not interfered.
The big wolves shrink back before the growth of the
thickly settled districts, and in the Eastern States they
often tend to disappear even from districts that are unin-
habited save by a few wilderness hunters. They have thus
disappeared almost entirely from Maine, the Adiron-
dacks, and the Alleghanies, although here and there they
are said to be returning to their old haunts. Their dis-
appearance is rather mysterious in some instances, for
they are certainly not all killed off. The black bear is
much easier killed, yet the black bear holds its own in
124 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
many parts of the land from which the wolf has vanished.
No animal is quite so difficult to kill as is the wolf,
whether by poison or rifle or hound. Yet, after a com-
paratively few have been slain, the entire species will
perhaps vanish from certain localities. In some localities
even the cougar, the easiest of all game to kill with
hounds, holds its own better. This, however, is not gen-
erally true.
But with all wild animals, it is a noticeable fact that
a course of contact with man continuing over many gen-
erations of animal life causes a species so to adapt itself
to its new surroundings that it can hold its own far better
than formerly. When white men take up a new country,
the game, and especially the big game, being entirely un-
used to contend with the new foe, succumb easily, and
are almost completely killed out. If any individuals sur-
vive at all, however, the succeeding generations are far
more difficult to exterminate than were their ancestors,
and they cling much more tenaciously to their old homes.
The game to be found in old and long-settled countries is
of course much more wary and able to take care of itself
than the game of an untrodden wilderness ; it is the wil-
derness life, far more than the actual killing of the wil-
derness game, which tests the ability of the wilderness
hunter.
After a time, game may even, for the time being, in-
crease in certain districts where settlements are thin. This
was true of the wolves throughout the northern cattle
country, in Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and the west-
ern ends of the Dakotas. In the old days wolves were
ABERNETHY RETURNS FROM THE HUNT
From a photograph, copyright, 1905, by Alexander Lambert, M.D.
WOLF-COURSING 125
very plentiful throughout this region, closely following
the huge herds of buffaloes. The white men who fol-
lowed these herds as professional buffalo-hunters were
often accompanied by other men, known as wolfers, who
poisoned these wolves for the sake of their fur. With the
disappearance of the buffalo the wolves diminished in
numbers so that they also seemed to disappear. Then In
the late eighties or early nineties the wolves began again
to increase in numbers until they became once more as
numerous as ever and infinitely more wary and difficult
to kill ; though as they were nocturnal in their habits they
were not often seen. Along the Little Missouri and in
many parts of Montana and Wyoming this increase was
very noticeable during the last decade of the nineteenth
century. They were at that time the only big animals
of the region which had increased in numbers. Such an
increase following a previous decrease in the same region
was both curious and interesting. I never knew the
wolves to be so numerous or so daring in their assaults
upon stock in the Little Missouri country as in the years
1894 ^0 1^9^ inclusive. I am unable wholly to account
for these changes. The first great diminution in the num-
bers of the wolves is only partially to be explained by
the poisoning; yet they seemed to disappear almost every-
where and for a number of years continued scarce. Then
they again became plentiful, reappearing in districts
from whence they had entirely vanished, and appearing
in new districts where they had been hitherto unknown.
Then they once more began to diminish in number. In
northwestern Colorado, in the White River country, cou-
126 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
gars fairly swarmed in the early nineties, while up to that
time the big gray wolves were almost or entirely un-
known. Then they began to come in, and increased
steadily in numbers, while the cougars diminished, so
that by the winter of 1902-3 they much outnumbered
the big cats, and committed great ravages among the
stock. The settlers were at their wits' ends how to deal
with the pests. At last a trapper came in, a shiftless fel-
low, but extraordinarily proficient in his work. He had
some kind of scent, the secret of which he would not re-
veal, which seemed to drive the wolves nearly crazy with
desire. In one winter in the neighborhood of the Key-
stone Ranch he trapped forty-two big gray wolves;
they still outnumber the cougars, which in that neigh-
borhood have been nearly killed out, but they are no
longer abundant.
At present wolves are decreasing in numbers all over
Colorado, as they are in Montana, Wyoming, and the
Dakotas. In some localities traps have been found
most effective; in others, poison; and in yet others,
hounds. I am inclined to think that where they have
been pursued in one manner for a long time any new
method will at first prove more efficacious. After a very
few wolves have been poisoned or trapped, the survivors
become so wary that only a master in the art can do any-
thing with them, while there are always a few wolves
which cannot be persuaded to touch a bait save under
wholly exceptional circumstances. From association
with the old she wolves the cubs learn as soon as they
are able to walk to avoid man's traces in every way, and
WOLF-COURSING 127
to look out for traps and poison. They are so shy and
show such extraordinary cunning in hiding and slinking
out of the way of the hunter that they are rarely killed
with the rifle. Personally I never shot but one. A bold
and good rider on a first-rate horse can, however, run
down even a big gray wolf in fair chase, and either rope
or shoot it. I have known a number of cow-punchers thus
to rope wolves when they happened to run across them
after they had gorged themselves on their quarry. A
former Colorado ranchman, Mr. Henry N. Pancoast,
who had done a good deal of wolf-hunting, and had
killed one which, judging by its skin, was a veritable
monster, wrote me as follows about his experiences :
'' I captured nearly all my wolves by running them
down and then either roped or shot them. I had one
mount that had great endurance, and when riding him
never failed to give chase to a wolf if I had the time to
spare; and never failed to get my quarry but two or three
times. I roped four full-grown and two cubs and shot
five full-grown and three cubs — the large wolf in ques-
tion being killed that way. And he was by far the hardest
proposition I ever tried, and I candidly think I run him
twenty miles before overhauling and shooting him (he
showed too much fight to use a rope) . As it was almost
dark, concluded to put him on horse and skin at ranch,
but had my hands full to get him on the saddle, was so
very heavy. My plan in running wolves down was to
get about three hundred yards from them, and then to
keep that distance until the wolf showed signs of fatigue,
when a little spurt would generally succeed in landing
128 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
him. In the case of the large one, however, I reckoned
without my host, as the wolf had as much go left as the
horse, so I tried slowing down to a walk and let the wolf
go; he . . . came down to a little trot and soon placed
a half mile between us, and finally went out of sight over
a high hill. I took my time and on reaching top of hill
saw wolf about four hundred yards off, and as I now
had a down grade managed to get my tired horse on a
lope and was soon up to the wolf, which seemed all stiff-
ened up, and one shot from my Winchester finished him.
We always had poison out, as wolves and coyotes killed
a great many calves. Never poisoned but two wolves,
and those were caught with fresh antelope liver and
entrails (coyotes were easily poisoned)."
In the early nineties the ravages of the -wolves along
the Little Missouri became so serious as thoroughly to
arouse the stockmen. Not only colts and calves, and
young trail stock, but in midwinter full-grown horses
and steers were continually slain. The county authori-
ties put a bounty of three dollars each on wolf scalps, to
which the ranchmen of the neighborhood added a further
bounty of five dollars. This made eight dollars for every
wolf, and as the skin was also worth something, the busi-
ness of killing wolves became profitable. Quite a number
of men tried poisoning or trapping, but the most success-
ful wolf hunter on the Little Missouri at that time was
a man who did not rely on poison at all, but on dogs.
He was named Massingale, and he always had a pack
of at least twenty hounds. The number varied, for a wolf
at bay is a terrible fighter, with jaws like those of a steel
BUNY MuoRh AND THE COYOTE
From a photograph, copyright, 190s, by Alexander Lambert, M.D.
WOLF-COURSING 129
trap, and teeth that cut like knives, so that the dogs were
continually disabled and sometimes killed, and the hunter
had always to be on the watch to add animals to his pack.
It was not a good-looking pack, but it was thoroughly fit
for its own work. Most of the dogs were greyhounds,
whether rough or smooth haired, but many of them were
big mongrels, part greyhound and part some other breed,
such as bulldog, mastiff, Newfoundland, bloodhound, or
collie. The only two requisites were that the dogs should
run fast and fight gamely; and in consequence they
formed as wicked, hard-biting a crew as ever ran down
and throttled a wolf. They were usually taken out ten
at a time, and by their aid Massingale killed over two
hundred wolves, including cubs. Of course there was
no pretence of giving the game fair play. The wolves
were killed as vermin, not for sport. The greatest havoc
was in the spring-time, when the she-wolves were fol-
lowed to their dens. Some of the hounds were very fast,
and they could usually overtake a young or weak wolf;
but an old dog-wolf, with a good start, unless run into at
once, would ordinarily get away if he were in running
trim. Frequently, however, he was caught when not in
running trim, for the hunter was apt to find him when he
had killed a calf or taken part in dragging down a horse
or steer, and was gorged with meat. Under these cir-
cumstances he could not run long before the pack. If
possible, as with all such packs, the hunter himself got
up in time to end the worry by a stab of his hunting-knife ;
but unless he was quick he had nothing to do, for the pack
was thoroughly competent to do its own killing. Grim
130
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
fighter though a great dog-wolf is, he stands no show be-
fore the onslaught of ten such hounds, agile and power-
ful, who rush on their antagonist in a body. Massingale's
dogs possessed great power in their jaws, and unless he
was up within two or three minutes after the wolf was
overtaken, they tore him to death, though one or more
of their number might be killed or crippled in the fight.
The wolf might be throttled without having the hide
on its neck torn; but when it was stretched out the dogs
ripped open its belly. Dogs do not get their teeth
through the skin of an old cougar; but they will tear up
either a bobcat or coyote.
In 1894 ^^^ ^^9^ ^ ^^^ ^ number of wolves on the
Little Missouri, although I was not looking for them. I
frequently came upon the remains of sheep and young
stock which they had killed; and once, upon the top of
a small plateau, I found the body of a large steer, while
the torn and trodden ground showed that he had fought
hard for his life before succumbing. There had been
two wolves engaged in the work, and the cunning beasts
had evidently acted in concert. Apparently, while one
attracted the steer's attention in front, the other, accord-
ing to the invariable wolf habit, attacked him from be-
hind, hamstringing him and tearing out his flanks. His
body was still warm when I came up, but the marauders
had slunk off, either seeing or smelling me. There was
no mistaking the criminals, however, for, unlike bears,
which usually attack an animal at the withers, or cougars,
which attack the throat or head, wolves almost invariably
attack their victim at the hind quarters and begin first
WOLF-COURSING 131
on the hams or flanks, if the animal is of any size. Owing
to their often acting in couples or in packs, the big wolves
do more damage to horned stock than cougars, but they
are not as dangerous to colts, and they are not nearly as
expert as the big cats in catching deer and mountain
sheep. When food is plentiful, good observers say that
they will not try to molest foxes; but, if hungry, they
certainly snap them up as quickly as they would fawns.
Ordinarily they show complete tolerance of the coyotes;
yet one bitter winter I knew of a coyote being killed and
eaten by a wolf.
Not only do the habits of wild beasts change under
changing conditions as time goes on, but there seems to
be some change even in their appearance. Thus the early
observers of the game of the Little Missouri, those who
wrote in the first half of the nineteenth century, spoke
much of the white wolves which were then so common in
the region. These white wolves represented in all prob-
ability only a color variety of the ordinary gray wolf ; and
it is difficult to say exactly why they disappeared. Yet
when about the year 1890 wolves again grew common
these white wolves were very, very rare; indeed I never
personally heard of but one being seen. This was on the
Upper Cannonball in 1892. A nearly black wolf was
killed not far from this spot in the year 1893. At the
present day black wolves are more common than white
wolves, which are rare indeed. But all these big wolves
are now decreasing in numbers, and in most places are
decreasing rapidly.
It will be noticed that on some points my observations
132 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
about wolves are in seeming conflict with those of other
observers as competent as I am; but I think the conflict
is more seeming than real, and I have concluded to let
my words stand. The great book of nature contains many
pages which are hard to read, and at times conscientious
students may well draw different interpretations of the
obscure and least-known texts. It may not be that either
observer is at fault, but what is true of an animal in one
locality may not be true of the same animal in another,
and even in the same locality two individuals of the same
species may differ widely in their traits and habits.
CHAPTER IV
HUNTING IN THE CATTLE COUNTRY; THE PRONGBUCK
The prongbuck is the most characteristic and distinc-
tive of American game animals. Zoologically speaking,
its position is unique. It is the only hollow-horned
ruminant which sheds its horns, or rather the horn
sheaths. We speak of it as an antelope, and it does of
course represent on our prairies the antelopes of the Old
World; but it stands apart from all other horned animals.
Its place in the natural world is almost as lonely as that
of the giraffe. In all its ways and habits it differs as much
from deer and elk as from goat and sheep. Now that the
buffalo has gone, it is the only game really at home on the
wide plains. It is a striking-looking little creature, with
its prominent eyes, single-pronged horns, and the sharply
contrasted white, brown and reddish of its coat. The
brittle hair is stiff, coarse and springy; on the rump it is
brilliantly white, and is erected when the animal is
alarmed or excited, so as to be very conspicuous. In
marked contrast to deer, antelope never seek to elude ob-
servation ; all they care for is to be able themselves to see.
As they have good noses and wonderful eyes, and as they
live by preference where there is little or no cover, shots
at them are usually obtained at far longer range than is
the case with other game ; and yet, as they are easily seen,
U3
134 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
and often stand looking at the hunter just barely within
very long rifle-range, they are always tempting their pur-
suer to the expenditure of cartridges. More shots are
wasted at antelope than at any other game. They would
be even harder to secure were it not that they are subject
to fits of panic folly, or excessive curiosity, which occa-
sionally put them fairly at the mercy of the rifle-bearing
hunter.
In the old days the prongbuck was found as soon as
the westward-moving traveller left the green bottom-
lands of the Mississippi, and from thence across to the
dry, open valleys of California, and northward to Canada
and southward into Mexico. It has everywhere been
gradually thinned out, and has vanished altogether from
what were formerly the extreme easterly and westerly
limits of its range. The rates of extermination of the dif-
ferent kinds of big game have been very unequal in
different localities. Each kind of big game has had its
own peculiar habitat in which it throve best, and each
has also been found more or less plentifully in other re-
gions where the circumstances were less favorable; and in
these comparatively unfavorable regions it early tends
to disappear before the advance of man. In consequence,
where the ranges of the different game animals overlap
and are intertwined, one will disappear first in one local-
ity, and another will disappear first where the conditions
are different. Thus the whitetail deer had thrust for-
ward along the very narrow river bottoms into the do-
main of the mule-deer and the prongbuck among the foot-
hills of the Rocky Mountains, and in these places it was
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 135
exterminated from the narrow strips which it inhabited
long before the mule-deer vanished from the high hills,
or the prongbuck from the great open plains. But along
great portions of the Missouri there are plenty of white-
tails yet left in the river bottoms, while the mule-deer
that once dwelt in the broken hills behind them, and the
prongbuck which lived on the prairie just back of these
bluffs, have both disappeared. In the same way the mule-
deer and the prongbuck are often found almost inter-
mingled through large regions in which plains, hills, and
mountains alternate. If such a region is mainly moun-
tainous, but contains a few valleys and table-lands, the
prongbuck is sure to vanish from the latter before the
mule-deer vanishes from the broken country. But if the
region is one primarily of plains, with here and there
rows of rocky hills in which the mule-deer is found, the
latter is killed off long before the prongbuck can be
hunted out of the great open stretches. The same is true
of the pronghorn and the wapiti. The size and value of
the wapiti make it an object of eager persecution on the
part of hunters. But as it can live in the forest-clad fast-
nesses of the Rockies, into which settlement does not go,
it outlasts over great regions the pronghorn, whose abode
is easily penetrated by sheep and cattle men. Under any-
thing like even conditions, however, the prongbuck, of
course, outlasts the wapiti. This was the case on the Lit-
tle Missouri. On that stream the bighorn also outlasted
the wapiti. In 1881 wapiti were still much more plenti-
ful than bighorns. Within the next decade they had
almost totally disappeared, while the bighorn was still
136 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
to be found; I shot one and saw others in 1893, ^^ which
time I had not authentic information of a single wapiti
remaining anywhere on the river in my neighborhood,
although it is possible that one or two still lurked in some
out-of-the-way recess. In Colorado at one time the big-
horn was nearly exterminated, while the wapiti still
withstood the havoc made among its huge herds; then fol-
lowed a period in which the rapidity of destruction of
the wapiti increased far beyond that of the bighorn.
I mention these facts partly because they are of inter-
est in themselves, but chiefly because they tend to explain
the widely different opinions expressed by competent ob-
servers about what superficially seem to be similar facts.
It cannot be too often repeated that allowance must be
made for the individual variability in the traits and char-
acters of animals of the same species, and especially of
the same species under different circumstances and in dif-
ferent localities; and allowance must also be made for
the variability of the individual factor in the observers
themselves. Many seemingly contradictory observations
of the habits of deer, wapiti, and prongbuck will be
found in books by the best hunters. Take such questions
as the keenness of sight of the deer as compared with the
prongbuck, and of the pugnacity of the wapiti, both act-
ual and relative, and a wide difference of opinion will be
found in three such standard works as Dodge's " The
Hunting-grounds of the Great West," Caton's " Deer and
Antelope of America," and the contributions of Mr.
Grinnell to the " Century Book of Sports." Sometimes
the difference will be in mere matters of opinion, as, for
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 137
instance, in the belief as to the relative worth of the sport
furnished by the chase of the different creatures; but
sometimes there is a direct conflict of fact. Colonel
Dodge, for instance, has put it upon record that the wapiti
is an exceedingly gentle animal, less dangerous than a
whitetail or blacktail buck in a close encounter, and that
the bulls hardly ever fight among themselves. My own
experience leads me to traverse in the most emphatic
manner every one of these conclusions, and all hunters
whom I have met feel exactly as I do ; yet no one would
question for a moment Colonel Dodge's general com-
petency as an observer. In the same way Mr. Grinnell
has a high opinion of the deer's keenness of sight. Judge
Caton absolutely disagrees with him, and my own ex-
perience tends to agree with that of the Judge — at least
to the extent of placing the deer's vision far below that
of the prongbuck and even that of the bighorn, and only
on a par with that of the wapiti. Yet Mr. Grinnell is
an unusually competent observer, whose opinion on any
such subject is entitled to unqualified respect.
Difference in habits may be due simply to difference
of locality, or to the need of adaptation to new conditions.
The prongbuck's habits about migration offer examples
of the former kind of difference. Over portions of its
range the prongbuck is not migratory at all. In other
parts the migrations are purely local. In yet other re-
gions the migrations are continued for great distances, im-
mense multitudes of the animals going to and fro in the
spring and fall along well-beaten tracks. I know of one
place in New Mexico where the pronghorn herds are ten-
138 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
ants of certain great plains throughout the entire year. I
know another region in northwestern Colorado where the
very few prongbucks still left, though they shift from val-
ley to valley, yet spend the whole year in the same stretch
of rolling, barren country. On the Little Missouri, how-
ever, during the eighties and early nineties, there was
a very distinct though usually local migration. Before
the Black Hills had been settled they were famous win-
tering places for the antelope, which swarmed from
great distances to them when cold weather approached;
those which had summered east of the Big Missouri actu-
ally swam the river in great herds, on their journey to
the Hills. The old hunters around my ranch insisted
that formerly the prongbuck had for the most part trav-
elled from the Little Missouri Bad Lands into the Black
Hills for the winter.
When I was ranching on that river, however, this
custom no longer obtained, for the Black Hills were too
well settled, and the herds of prongbuck that wintered
there were steadily diminishing in numbers. At that
time, from 1883 to 1896, the seasonal change in habits,
and shift of position, of the prongbucks were well
marked. As soon as the new grass sprang they appeared
in great numbers upon the plains. They were especially
fond of the green, tender blades that came up where the
country had been burned over. If the region had been
devastated by prairie fires in the fall, the next spring it
was certain to contain hundreds and thousands of prong-
bucks. All through the summer they remained out on
these great open plains, coming to drink at the little pools
h-
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 139
in the creek beds, and living where there was no shelter
of any kind. As winter approached they began to gather
in bands. Some of these bands apparently had regular
wintering places to the south of us, in Pretty Buttes and
beyond; and close to my ranch, at the crossing of the
creek called Beaver, there were certain trails which these
antelope regularly travelled, northward in the spring and
southward in the fall. But other bands would seek out
places in the Bad Lands near by, gathering together on
some succession of plateaus which were protected by
neighboring hills from the deep drifts of snow. Here
they passed the winter, on short commons, it is true (they
graze, not browsing like deer), but without danger of
perishing in the snow-drifts. On the other hand, if the
skin hunters discovered such a wintering place, they were
able to butcher practically the entire band, if they so de-
sired, as the prongbucks were always most reluctant to
leave such a chosen ground.
Normally the prongbuck avoids both broken ground
and timber. It is a queer animal, with keen senses, but
with streaks of utter folly in its character. Time and
again I have known bands rush right by me, when I
happened to surprise them feeding near timber or hills,
and got between them and the open plains. The animals
could have escaped without the least difficulty if they had
been willing to go into the broken country, or through
even a few rods of trees and brush; and yet they preferred
to rush madly by me at close range, in order to get out
to their favorite haunts. But nowadays there are certain
localities where the prongbucks spend a large part of
I40 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
their time in the timber or in rough, hilly country, feed-
ing and bringing up their young in such localities.
Typically, however, the prongbuck is preeminently a
beast of the great open plains, eating their harsh, dry
pasturage, and trusting to its own keen senses and speed
for its safety. All the deer are fond of skulking; the
whitetail preeminently so. The prongbuck, on the con-
trary, never endeavors to elude observation. Its sole aim
is to be able to see its enemies, and it cares nothing what-
ever about its enemies seeing it. Its coloring is very
conspicuous, and is rendered still more so by its habit
of erecting the white hair on its rump. It has a very
erect carriage, and when it thinks itself in danger it
always endeavors to get on some crest or low hill from
which it can look all about. The big bulging eyes, sit-
uated at the base of the horns, scan the horizon far and
near like twin telescopes. They pick out an object at
such a distance that it would entirely escape the notice of
a deer. When suspicious, they have a habit of barking,
uttering a sound something like " kau," and repeating
it again and again, as they walk up and down, en-
deavoring to find out if danger lurks in the unusual ob-
ject. They are extremely curious, and in the old days
it was often possible to lure them toward the hunter by
waving a red handkerchief to and fro on a stick, or even
by lying on one's back and kicking the legs. Nowadays,
however, there are very few localities indeed in which
they are sufficiently unsophisticated to make it worth
while trying these time-honored tricks of the long-van-
ished trappers and hunters.
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 141
Along the Little Missouri the fawns, sometimes one
and sometimes two in number, were dropped in May or
early in June. At that time the antelope were usually
found in herds which the mother did not leave until she
was about to give birth to the fawn. During the first
few days the fawn's safety is to be found only in its not
attracting attention. During this time it normally lies
perfectly flat on the ground, with its head outstretched,
and makes no effort to escape. While out on the spring
round-up I have come across many of these fawns. Once,
in company with several cowboys, I was riding behind
a bunch of cattle which, as we hurried them, spread out
in open order ahead of us. Happening to cast down my
eyes I saw an antelope fawn directly ahead of me. The
bunch of cattle had passed all around it, but it made not
the slightest sign, not even when I halted, got off my
pony, and took it up in my arms. It was useless to take
it to camp and try to rear it, and so I speedily put it
down again. Scanning the neighborhood, I saw the doe
hanging about some half a mile off, and when I looked
back from the next divide I could see her gradually draw-
ing near to the fawn.
If taken when very young, antelope make cunning
and amusing pets, and I have often seen them around the
ranches. There was one in the ranch of a Mrs. Blank
who had a station on the Deadwood stage line some eigh-
teen years ago. She was a great worker in buckskin, and
I got her to make me the buckskin shirt I still use. There
was an antelope fawn that lived at the house, wandering
wherever it wished ; but it would not permit me to touch
142 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
it. As I sat inside the house it would come in and hop
up on a chair, looking at me sharply all the while. No
matter how cautiously I approached, I could never put
my hand upon it, as at the last moment it would spring
ofif literally as quick as a bird would fly. One of my
neighbors on the Little Missouri, Mr. Howard Eaton,
had at one time upon his ranch three little antelope whose
foster-mother was a sheep, and who were really absurdly
tame. I was fond of patting them and of giving them
crusts, and the result was that they followed me about
so closely that I had to be always on the lookout to see
that I did not injure them. They were on excellent terms
with the dogs, and were very playful. It was a comic
sight to see them skipping and hopping about the old ewe
when anything happened to alarm her and she started ofif
at a clumsy waddle. Nothing could surpass the tameness
of the antelope that are now under Mr. Hornaday's care
at the Bronx Zoological Garden in New York. The last
time that I visited the garden some repairs were being
made inside the antelope enclosure, and a dozen work-
men had gone in to make them. The antelope regarded
the workmen with a friendliness and curiosity untem-
pered by the slightest touch of apprehension. When the
men took off their coats the little creatures would nose
them over to see if they contained anything edible, and
they would come close up and watch the men plying the
pick with the utmost interest. Mr. Hornaday took us in-
side, and they all came up in the most friendly manner.
One or two of the bucks would put their heads against
our legs and try to push us around, but not roughly. Mr.
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 143
Hornaday told me that he was having great difficulty,
exactly as with the mule-deer, in acclimatizing the ante-
lope, especially as the food was so different from what
they were accustomed to in their native haunts.
The wild fawns are able to run well a few days after
they are born. They then accompany the mother every-
where. Sometimes she joins a band of others; more often
she stays alone with her fawn, and perhaps one of the
young of the previous year, until the rut begins. Of all
game the prongbuck seems to me the most excitable dur-
ing the rut. The males run the does much as do the
bucks of the mule and whitetail deer. If there are no
does present, I have sometimes watched a buck run to
and fro by himself. The first time I saw this I was
greatly interested, and could form no idea of what the
buck was doing. He was by a creek bed in a slight de-
pression or shallow valley, and was grazing uneasily.
After a little while he suddenly started and ran just as
hard as he could, off in a straight direction, nearly away
from me. I thought that somehow or other he had dis-
covered my presence; but he suddenly wheeled and came
back to the original place, still running at his utmost
speed. Then he halted, moved about with the white
hairs on his rump outspread, and again dashed off at full
speed, halted, wheeled, and came back. Two or three
times he did this, and let me get very close to him be-
fore he discovered me. I was too much interested in
what he was doing to desire to shoot him.
In September, sometimes not earlier than October,
the big bucks begin to gather the does into harems. Each
144 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
buck is then constantly on the watch to protect his harem
from outsiders, and steal another doe if he can get a
chance. I have seen a comparatively young buck who
had appropriated a doe, hustle her hastily out of the
country as soon as he saw another antelope in the neigh-
borhood; while, on the other hand, a big buck, already
with a good herd of does, will do his best to appropriate
any other that comes in sight. The bucks fight fearlessly
but harmlessly among themselves, locking their horns
and then pushing as hard as they can.
Although their horns are not very formidable weap-
ons, they are bold little creatures, and if given a chance
will stand at bay before either hound or coyote. A doe
will fight most gallantly for her fawn, and is an over-
match for a single coyote, but of course she can do but lit-
tle against a large wolf. The wolves are occasionally very
destructive to the herds. The cougar, however, which
is a much worse foe than the wolf to deer and mountain
sheep, can but rarely molest the prongbuck, owing to the
nature of the latter's haunts. Eagles, on occasion, take
the fawns, as they do those of deer.
I have always been fond of the chase of the prong-
buck. While I lived on my ranch on the Little Mis-
souri it was, next to the mule-deer, the game which I
most often followed, and on the long wagon strips which
I occasionally took from my ranch to the Black Hills,
to the Big Horn Mountains, or into eastern Montana,
prongbuck venison was our usual fresh meat, save when
we could kill prairie-chickens and ducks with our rifles,
which was not always feasible. In my mind the prong-
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 145
buck is always associated with the open prairies during
the spring, summer, or early fall. It has happened that
I have generally pursued the bighorn in bitter weather;
and when we laid in our stock of winter meat, mule-
deer was our usual game. Though I have shot prongbuck
in winter, I never liked to do so, as I felt the animals
were then having a sufficiently hard struggle for existence
anyhow. But in the spring the meat of the prongbuck
was better than that of any other game, and, moreover,
there was not the least danger of mistaking the sexes,
and killing a doe accidentally, and accordingly I rarely
killed anything but pronghorns at that season. In those
days we never got any fresh meat, whether on the ranch or
while on the round-up or on a wagon trip, unless we shot
it, and salt pork became a most monotonous diet after a
time.
Occasionally I killed the prongbuck in a day's hunt
from my ranch. If I started with the intention of prong-
buck hunting, I always went on horseback; but twice I
killed them on foot when I happened to run across them
by accident while looking for mule-deer. I shall always
remember one of these occasions. I was alone in the Elk-
horn ranch-house at the time, my foreman and the only
cowpuncher who was not on the round-up having driven
to Medora, some forty miles away, in order to bring down
the foreman's wife and sister, who were going to spend
the summer with him. It was the fourth day of his ab-
sence. I expected him in the evening and wanted to have
fresh meat, and so after dinner I shouldered my rifle and
strolled off through the hills. It was too early in the
146 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
day to expect to see anything, and my intention was sim-
ply to walk out until I was five or six miles from the
ranch, and then work carefully home through a likely
country toward sunset, as by this arrangement I would
be in a good game region at the very time that the ani-
mals were likely to stir abroad. It was a glaring, late-
spring day, and in the hot sun of mid-afternoon I had no
idea that anything would be moving, and was not keep-
ing a very sharp lookout. After an hour or two's steady
tramping I came into a long, narrow valley, bare of trees
and brushwood, and strolled along it, following a cattle
trail that led up the middle. The hills rose steeply into
a ridge crest on each side, sheer clay shoulders breaking
the mat of buffalo-grass which elsewhere covered the
sides of the valley as well as the bottom. It was very hot
and still, and I was paying but little attention to my sur-
roundings, when my eye caught a sudden movement on
the ridge crest to my right, and, dropping on one knee
as I wheeled around, I saw the head and neck of a prong-
buck rising above the crest. The animal was not above
a hundred yards off, and stood motionless as it stared at
me. At the crack of the rifle the head disappeared; but
as I sprang clear of the smoke I saw a cloud of dust rise
on the other side of the ridge crest, and felt convinced
that the quarry had fallen. I was right. On climbing
the ridge crest I found that on the other side it sank
abruptly in a low cliff of clay, and at the foot of this,
thirty feet under me, the prongbuck lay with its neck
broken. After dressing it I shouldered the body entire,
thinking that I should like to impress the new-comers by
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 147
the sight of so tangible a proof of my hunting prowess as
whole prongbuck hanging up in the cottonwoods by the
house. As it was a well-grown buck the walk home un-
der the hot sun was one of genuine toil.
The spot where I ran across this prongbuck was miles
away from the nearest plains, and it was very unusual
to see one in such rough country. In fact, the occurrence
was wholly exceptional ; just as I once saw three bighorn
rams, which usually keep to the roughest country, de-
liberately crossing the river bottom below my ranch, and
going for half a mile through the thick Cottonwood tim-
ber. Occasionally, however, parties of prongbuck came
down the creek bottoms to the river. Once I struck a
couple of young bucks in the bottom of a creek which led
to the Chimney Butte ranch-house, and stalked them
without difficulty; for as prongbuck make no effort to
hide, if there is good cover even their sharp eyes do not
avail them. On another occasion several does and fawns,
which we did not molest, spent some time on what we
called " the corral bottom," which was two or three miles
above the ranch-house. In the middle of this bottom we
had built a corral for better convenience in branding the
calves when the round-up came near our ranch — as the
bottom on which the ranch-house stood was so thickly
wooded as to make it difficult to work cattle thereon.
The does and fawns hung around the corral bottom for
some little time, and showed themselves very curious and
by no means shy.
When I went from the ranch for a day's prongbuck
hunting of set purpose, I always rode a stout horse and
148 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
started by dawn. The prongbucks are almost the only
game that can be hunted as well during the heat of the
day as at any other time. They occasionally lie down for
two or three hours about noon in some hollow where they
cannot be seen, but usually there is no place where they
are sure they can escape observation even when resting;
and when this is the case they choose a somewhat con-
spicuous station and trust to their own powers of observa-
tion, exactly as they do when feeding. There is there-
fore no necessity, as with deer, of trying to strike them at
dawn or dusk. The reason why I left the ranch before
sunrise and often came back long after dark was because
I had to ride at least a dozen miles to get out to the ground
and a dozen to get back, and if after industrious walking
I failed at first to find my game, I would often take the
horse again and ride for an hour or two to get into new
country. Prongbuck water once a day, often travelling
great distances to or from some little pool or spring. Of
course, if possible, I liked to leave the horse by such a
pool or spring. On the great plains to which I used to
make these excursions there was plenty of water in early
spring, and it would often run, here and there, in the
upper courses of some of the creeks — which, however,
usually contained running water only when there had
been a cloudburst or freshet. As the season wore on the
country became drier and drier. Water would remain
only in an occasional deep hole, and few springs were left
in which there was so much as a trickle. In a strange
country I could not tell where these water-holes were, but
in the neighborhood of the ranch I of course knew where
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 149
I was likely to find them. Often, however, I was disap-
pointed; and more than once after travelling many miles
to where I hoped to find water, there would be nothing
but sun-cracked mud, and the horse and I would have
eighteen hours of thirst in consequence. A ranch horse,
however, is accustomed to such incidents, and of course
when a man spends half the time riding, it is merely a
matter of slight inconvenience to go so long without a
drink.
Nevertheless, if I did reach a spring, it turned the
expedition into pleasure instead of toil. Even in the hot
weather the ride toward the plains over the hills was
very lovely. It was beautiful to see the red dawn quicken
from the first glimmering gray in the east, and then to
watch the crimson bars glint on the tops of the fantasti-
cally shaped barren hills when the sun flamed, burning
and splendid, above the horizon. In the early morning
the level beams threw into sharp relief the strangely
carved and channelled cliff walls of the buttes. There
was rarely a cloud to dim the serene blue of the sky. By
the time the heat had grown heavy I had usually reached
the spring or pool, where I unsaddled the horse, watered
him, and picketed him out to graze. Then, under the
hot sun, I would stride ofif for the hunting proper. On
such occasions I never went to where the prairie was ab-
solutely flat. There were always gently rolling stretches
broken by shallow watercourses, slight divides, and even
low mounds, sometimes topped with strangely shaped
masses of red scoria or with petrified trees. My object,
of course, was, either with my unaided eyes or with the
150 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
help of my glasses, to catch sight of the prongbucks be-
fore they saw me. I speedily found, by the way, that if
they were too plentiful this was almost impossible. The
more abundant deer are in a given locality the more apt
one is to run across them, and of course if the country is
sufficiently broken, the same is true of prongbucks; but
where it is very flat and there are many different bands in
sight at the same time, it is practically impossible to keep
out of sight of all of them, and as they are also all in
sight of one another, if one flees the others are certain
to take the alarm. Under such circumstances I have usu-
ally found that the only pronghorns I got were obtained
by accident, so to speak; that is, by some of them unex-
pectedly running my way, or by my happening to come
across them in some nook where I could not see them, or
they me.
Prongbucks are very fast runners indeed, even faster
than deer. They vary greatly in speed, however, precise-
ly as is the case with deer; in fact, I think that the aver-
age hunter makes altogether too little account of this
individual variation among different animals of the same
kind. Under the same conditions different deer and ante-
lope vary in speed and wariness, exactly as bears and cou-
gars vary in cunning and ferocity. When in perfect con-
dition a full-grown buck antelope, from its strength and
size. Is faster and more enduring than an old doe; but a
fat buck, before the rut has begun, will often be pulled
down by a couple of good greyhounds much more speed-
ily than a flying yearling or two-year-old doe. Under
favorable circumstances, when the antelope was jumped
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 151
near by, I have seen one overhauled and seized by a first-
class greyhound; and, on the other hand, I have more
than once seen a pronghorn run away from a whole pack
of just as good dogs. With a fair start, and on good
ground, a thoroughbred horse, even though handi-
capped by the weight of a rider, will run down an ante-
lope ; but this is a feat which should rarely be attempted,
because such a race, even when carried to a successful
issue, is productive of the utmost distress to the steed.
Ordinary horses will sometimes run down an antelope
which is slower than the average. I once had on my
ranch an under-sized old Indian pony named White
Eye, which, when it was fairly roused, showed a remark-
able turn of speed, and had great endurance. One morn-
ing on the round-up, when for some reason we did not
work the cattle, I actually ran down an antelope in fair
chase on this old pony. It was a nursing doe, and I came
over the crest of the hill, between forty and fifty yards
away from it. As it wheeled to start back, the old cayuse
pricked up his ears with great interest, and the moment
I gave him a sign was after it like a shot. Whether, being
a cow-pony, he started to run it just as if it were a calf
or a yearling trying to break out of the herd, or whether
he was overcome by dim reminiscences of buffalo-hunt-
ing in his Indian youth, I know not. At any rate, after
the doe he went, and in a minute or two I found I was
drawing up to her. I had a revolver, but of course did
not wish to kill her, and so got my rope ready to try to
take her alive. She ran frantically, but the old pony,
bending level to the ground, kept up his racing lope and
152 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
closed right in beside her. As I came up she fairly
bleated. An expert with the rope would have captured
her with the utmost ease; but I missed, sending the coil
across her shoulders. She again gave an agonized bleat,
or bark, and wheeled around like a shot. The cow-pony
stopped almost, but not quite, as fast, and she got a slight
start, and it was some little time before I overhauled her
again. When I did I repeated the performance, and this
time when she wheeled she succeeded in getting on some
ground where I could not follow, and I was thrown out.
Normally, a horseman without greyhounds can hope
for nothing more than to get within fair shooting range;
and this only by taking advantage of the prongbucks'
peculiarity of running straight ahead in the direction in
which they are pointed, when once they have settled into
their pace. Usually, as soon as they see a hunter they run
straight away from him; but sometimes they make their
flight at an angle, and as they do not like to change their
course when once started, it is thus possible, with a good
horse, to cut tnem off from the point toward which they
are headed, and get a reasonably close shot.
I have done a good deal of coursing with greyhounds
at one time or another, but always with scratch packs.
There are a few ranchmen who keep leashes of grey-
hounds of pure blood, bred and trained to antelope cours-
ing, and who do their coursing scientifically, carrying the
dogs out to the hunting-grounds in wagons and exercis-
ing every care in the sport; but these men are rare. The
average man who dwells where antelope are sufficiently
abundant to make coursing a success, simply follows the
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 153
pursuit at odd moments, with whatever long-legged dogs
he and his neighbors happen to have; and his methods of
coursing are apt to be as rough as his outfit. My own
coursing was precisely of this character. At different
times I had on my ranch one or two high-classed grey-
hounds and Scotch deerhounds, with which we coursed
deer and antelope, as well as jack-rabbits, foxes, and
coyotes; and we usually had with them one or two or-
dinary hounds, and various half-bred dogs. I must add,
however, that some of the latter were very good. I can
recall in particular one fawn-colored beast, a cross be-
tween a greyhound and a foxhound, which ran nearly
as fast as the former, though it occasionally yelped in
shrill tones. It could also trail well, and was thoroughly
game; on one occasion it ran down and killed a coyote
single-handed.
On going out with these dogs, I rarely chose a day
when I was actually in need of fresh meat. If this was
the case, I usually went alone with the rifle; but if one
or two other men were at the ranch, and we wanted a
morning's fun, we would often summon the dogs, mount
our horses, and go trooping out to the antelope-ground.
As there was good deer-country between the ranch bot-
tom and the plains where we found the prongbuck, it not
infrequently happened that we had a chase after black-
tail or whitetail on the way. Moreover, when we got out
to the ground, before sighting antelope, it frequently hap-
pened that the dogs would jump a jack-rabbit or a fox,
and away the whole set would go after it, streaking
through the short grass, sometimes catching their prey
154 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
in a few hundred yards, and sometimes having to run a
mile or so. In consequence, by the time we reached the
regular hunting-ground the dogs were apt to have lost
a good deal of their freshness. We would get them in
behind the horses and creep cautiously along, trying to
find some solitary prongbuck in a suitable place, where
we could bring up the dogs from behind a hillock and
give them a fair start. Usually we failed to get the dogs
near enough for a good start; and in most cases their
chases after unwounded prongbuck resulted in the quarry
running clean away from them. Thus the odds were
greatly against them; but, on the other hand, we helped
them wherever possible with the rifle. We usually rode
well scattered out, and if one of us put up an antelope,
or had a chance at one when driven by the dogs, he
always fired, and the pack were saved from the ill effects
of total discouragement by so often getting these wounded
beasts. It was astonishing to see how fast an antelope
with a broken leg could run. If such a beast had a good
start, and especially if the dogs were tired, it would often
lead them a hard chase, and the dogs would be utterly
exhausted after it had been killed ; so that we would have
to let them lie where they were for a long time before
trying to lead them down to some stream-bed. If pos-
sible, we carried water for them in canteens.
There were red-letter days, however, on which our
dogs fairly ran down and killed unwounded antelope —
days when the weather was cool, and when it happened
that we got our dogs out to the ground without their being
tired by previous runs, and found our quarry soon, and
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 155
in favorable places for slipping the hounds. I remember
one such chase in particular. We had at the time a mixed
pack, in which there was only one dog of my own, the
others being contributed from various sources. It in-
cluded two greyhounds, a rough-coated deerhound, a fox-
hound, and the fawn-colored cross-bred mentioned above.
We rode out in the early morning, the dogs trotting
behind us; and, coming to a low tract of rolling hills,
just at the edge of the great prairie, we separated and
rode over the crest of the nearest ridge. Just as we topped
it, a fine buck leaped up from a hollow a hundred yards
off, and turned to look at us for a moment. All the dogs
were instantly spinning toward him down the grassy
slope. He apparently saw those at the right, and, turn-
ing, raced away from us in a diagonal line, so that the
left-hand greyhound, which ran cunning and tried to
cut him off, was very soon almost alongside. He saw her,
however — she was a very fast bitch — just in time, and,
wheeling, altered his course to the right. As he reached
the edge of the prairie, this alteration nearly brought him
in contact with the cross-bred, which had obtained a rather
poor start, on the extreme right of the line. Around went
the buck again, evidently panic-struck and puzzled to
the last degree, and started straight off across the prairie,
the dogs literally at his heels, and we, urging our horses
with whip and spur, but a couple of hundred yards be-
hind. For half a mile the pace was tremendous, when
one of the greyhounds made a spring at his ear, but fail-
ing to make good his hold, was thrown off. However,
it halted the buck for a moment, and made him turn
156 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
quarter round, and in a second the deerhound had seized
him by the flank and thrown him, and all the dogs piled
on top, never allowing him to rise.
Later we again put up a buck not far off. At first
it went slowly, and the dogs hauled up on it; but when
they got pretty close, it seemed to see them, and letting
itself out, went clean away from them almost without
effort.
Once or twice we came upon bands of antelope, and
the hounds would immediately take after them. I was
always rather sorry for this, however, because the fright-
ened animals, as is generally the case when beasts are
in a herd, seemed to impede one another, and the chase
usually ended by the dogs seizing a doe, for it was of
course impossible to direct them to any particular beast.
It will be seen that with us coursing was a homely
sport. Nevertheless we had good fun, and I shall always
have enjoyable memories of the rapid gallops across the
prairie, on the trail of a flying prongbuck.
Usually my pronghorn hunting has been done while
I have been off with a wagon on a trip intended prima-
rily for the chase, or else while travelling for some other
purpose.
All life in the wilderness is so pleasant that the
temptation is to consider each particular variety, while
one is enjoying it, as better than any other. A canoe trip
through the great forests, a trip with a pack-train among
the mountains, a trip on snow-shoes through the silent,
mysterious fairyland of the woods in winter — each has
its peculiar charm. To some men the sunny monotony
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 157
of the great plains is wearisome; personally there are few
things I have enjoyed more than journeying over them
where the game was at all plentiful. Sometimes I have
gone off for three or four days alone on horseback, with
a slicker or oilskin coat behind the saddle, and some salt
and hardtack as my sole provisions. But for comfort on
a trip of any length it was always desirable to have a
wagon. My regular outfit consisted of a wagon and team
driven by one man who cooked, together with another
man and four riding ponies, two of which we rode, while
the other two were driven loose or led behind the wagon.
While it is eminently desirable that a hunter should be
able to rough it, and should be entirely willing to put
up with the bare minimum of necessities, and to undergo
great fatigue and hardship, it is yet not at all necessary
that he should refrain from comfort of a wholesome sort
when it is obtainable. By taking the wagon we could
carry a tent to put up if there was foul weather. I had
a change of clothes to put on if I was wet, two or three
books to read — and nothing adds more to the enjoyment
of a hunting trip — as well as plenty of food ; while having
two men made me entirely foot-loose as regards camp,
so that I could hunt whenever I pleased, and, if I came
in tired, I simply rested, instead of spending two or three
hours in pitching camp, cooking, tethering horses, and
doing the innumerable other little things which in the
aggregate amount to so much.
On such a trip, when we got into unknown country,
it was of course very necessary to stay near the wagon,
especially if we had to hunt for water. But if we knew
158 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the country at all, we would decide in the morning about
where the camp was to be made in the afternoon, and
then I would lope off on my own account, while the
wagon lumbered slowly across the rough prairie sward
straight toward its destination. Sometimes I took the
spare man with me, and sometimes not. It was conven-
ient to have him, for there are continually small emer-
gencies in which it is well to be with a companion. For
instance, if one jumps off for a sudden shot, there is al-
ways a slight possibility that any but a thoroughly trained
horse will get frightened and gallop away. On some of
my horses I could absolutely depend, but there were
others, and very good ones too, which would on rare occa-
sions fail me; and few things are more disheartening
than a long stern chase after one's steed under such cir-
cumstances, with the unpleasant possibility of seeing him
leave the country entirely and strike out for the ranch
fifty or sixty miles distant. If there is a companion with
one, all danger of this is over. Moreover, in galloping
at full speed after the game it is impossible now and then
to avoid a tumble, as the horse may put his leg into a
prairie-dog hole or badger burrow; and on such occasions
a companion may come in very handily. On the other
hand, there is so great a charm in absolute solitude, in the
wild, lonely freedom of the great plains, that often I
would make some excuse and go off entirely by myself.
Such rides had a fascination of their own. Hour after
hour the wiry pony shuffled onward across the sea of
short, matted grass. On every side the plains stretched
seemingly limitless. Sometimes there would be no ob-
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 159
ject to break the horizon; sometimes across a score of
miles there would loom through the clear air the fantastic
outlines of a chain of buttes, rising grim and barren. Oc-
casionally there might be a slightly marked watercourse,
every drop of moisture long dried; and usually there
would not be as much as the smallest sage brush anywhere
in sight. As the sun rose higher and higher the shadows
of horse and rider shortened, and the beams were reflected
from the short, bleached blades until in the hot air all
the landscape afar off seemed to dance and waver. Often
on such trips days went by without our coming across
another human being, and the loneliness and vastness of
the country seemed as unbroken as if the old vanished
days had returned — the days of the wild wilderness wan-
derers, and the teeming myriads of game they followed,
and the scarcely wilder savages against whom they
warred.
Now and then prongbuck would appear, singly or
in bands; and their sharp bark of alarm or curiosity
would come to me through the still, hot air over great
distances, as they stood with head erect looking at me,
the white patches on their rumps shining in the sun, and
the bands and markings on their heads and necks show-
ing as if they were in livery. Scan the country as care-
fully as I would, they were far more apt to see me than
I was them, and once they had seen me, it was normally
hopeless to expect to get them. But their strange freak-
ishness of nature frequently offsets the keenness of their
senses. At least half of the prongbucks which I shot were
obtained, not by stalking, but by coming across them
i6o AN AMERICAN HUNTER
purely through their own fault. Though the prairie
seemed level, there was really a constant series of un-
dulations, shallow and of varying width. Now and then
as I topped some slight rise I would catch a glimpse of
a little band of pronghorns feeding, and would slip off
my horse before they could see me. A hasty determina-
tion as to where the best chance of approaching them lay
would be followed by a half-hour's laborious crawl, a
good part of the time flat on my face. They might dis-
cover me when I was still too far for a shot; or by taking
advantage of every little inequality I might get within
long range before they got a glimpse of me, and then in
a reasonable proportion of cases I would bag my buck.
At other times the buck would come to me. Perhaps one
would suddenly appear over a divide himself, and his
curiosity would cause him to stand motionless long
enough to give me a shot; while on other occasions I
have known one which was out of range to linger around,
shifting his position as I shifted mine, until by some sud-
den gallop or twist I was able to get close enough to
empty my magazine at him.
When the shadows had lengthened, but before any
coolness had come into the air, I would head for the ap-
pointed camping-place. Sometimes this would be on
the brink of some desolate little pool under a low, tree-
less butte, or out on the open prairie where the only wood
was what we had brought with us. At other times I
would find the wagon drawn up on the edge of some
shrunken plains river, under a line of great cottonwoods
with splintered branches and glossy leaves that rustled
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY i6i
all day long. Such a camp was always comfortable, for
there was an abundance of wood for the fire, plenty of
water, and thick feed in which the horses grazed — one
or two being picketed and the others feeding loose until
night came on. If I had killed a prongbuck, steaks were
speedily sizzling in the frying-pan over the hot coals.
If I had failed to get anything, I would often walk a
mile or two down or up the river to see if I could not
kill a couple of prairie-chickens or ducks. If the even-
ing was at all cool, we built a fire as darkness fell, and
sat around it, while the leaping flames lit up the trunks
of the cottonwoods and gleamed on the pools of water
in the half-dry river bed. Then I would wrap myself
in my blanket and lie looking up at the brilliant stars
until I fell asleep.
In both 1893 ^^^ ^^94 I made trips to a vast tract of
rolling prairie land, some fifty miles from my ranch,
where I had for many years enjoyed the keen pleasure
of hunting the prongbuck. In 1893 ^^^ pronghorned
bands were as plentiful in this district as I have ever seen
them an5rv\'here. Lambert was with me; and in a week's
trip, including the journey out and back, we easily shot
all the antelope we felt we had any right to kill; for we
only shot to get meat, or an unusually fine head. Lambert
did most of the shooting; and I have never seen a profes-
sional hunter do better in stalking antelope on the open
prairie. I myself fired at only two antelope, both of
which had already been missed. In each case a hard run
and much firing at long ranges, together with in one case
some skilful manoeuvring, got me my game; yet one buck
1 62 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
cost ten cartridges and the other eight. In 1894 I had ex-
actly the reverse experience. I killed five antelope for
thirty-six shots, but each one that I killed was killed with
the first bullet, and in not one case where I missed the
first time did I hit with any subsequent shot. These five
antelope were killed at an average distance of about 150
yards. Those that I missed were, of course, much farther
off on an average, and I usually emptied my magazine at
each. The number of cartridges spent would seem ex-
traordinary to a tyro; and an unusually skilful shot, or
else a very timid shot who fears to take risks, will of course
make a better showing per head killed; but I doubt if
men with experience in antelope hunting, who keep an
accurate account of the cartridges they expend, will see
anything much out of the way in the performance.
During the years I have hunted in the West I have
always, where possible, kept a record of the number of
cartridges expended for every head of game killed, and
of the distances at which it was shot. I have found that
with bison, bear, moose, elk, caribou, bighorn and white
goat, where the animals shot at were mostly of large size
and usually stationary, and where the mountainous or
wooded country gave chance for a close approach, the
average distance at which I have killed the game has been
eighty yards, and the average number of cartridges ex-
pended per head slain, three; one of these representing the
death-shot, and the others standing either for misses out-
right, of which there were not many, or else for wounding
game which escaped, or which I afterward overtook, or
for stopping cripples or charging beasts. I have killed
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 163
but two peccaries, using but one cartridge for each; they
were close up. My experiences with cougar have already
been narrated. At wolves and coyotes I have generally
had to take running shots at very long range, and I have
shot but two — one of each — for fifty cartridges. Blacktail
deer I have generally shot at about ninety yards, at an ex-
penditure of about four cartridges apiece. Whitetail I
have killed at shorter range; but the shots were generally
running, often taken under difficult circumstances, so that
my expenditure of cartridges was rather larger. Ante-
lope, on the other hand, I have on the average shot at a lit-
tle short of 150 yards, and they have cost me about nine
cartridges apiece. This, of course, as I have explained
above, does not mean that I have missed eight out of nine
antelope, for often the entire nine cartridges would be
spent at an antelope which I eventually got. It merely
means that, counting all the shots of every description
fired at antelope, I had one head to show for each nine
cartridges expended.
Thus, the first antelope I shot in 1893 ^^^^t me ten
cartridges, of which three hit him, while the seven that
missed were fired at over 400 yards' distance while he was
running. We saw him while we were with the wagon.
As we had many miles to go before sunset, we cared
nothing about frightening other game, and, as we had
no fresh meat, it was worth while to take some chances
to procure it. When I first fired, the prongbuck had al-
ready been shot at and was in full flight. He was beyond
all reasonable range, but some of our bullets went over
him and he began to turn. By running to one side I got
1 64 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
a shot at him at a little over 400 paces, as he slowed to
a walk, bewildered by the firing, and the bullet broke his
hip. I missed him two or three times as he plunged off,
and then by hard running down a watercourse got a shot
at 180 paces and broke his shoulder, and broke his neck
with another bullet when I came up.
This one was shot while going out to the hunting-
ground. While there Lambert killed four others. I did
not fire again until on our return, when I killed another
buck one day while we were riding with the wagon.
The day was gray and overcast. There were slight flur-
ries of snow, and the cold wind chilled us as it blew across
the endless reaches of sad-colored prairie. Behind us
loomed Sentinel Butte, and all around the rolling surface
was broken by chains of hills, by patches of bad lands,
or by isolated, saddle-shaped mounds. The ranch wagon
jolted over the uneven sward, and plunged in and out of
the dry beds of the occasional water courses; for we were
following no road, but merely striking northward across
the prairie toward the P. K. ranch. We went at a good
pace, for the afternoon was bleak, the wagon was lightly
loaded, and the Sheriff of the county, whose deputy I had
been, and who was serving for the nonce as our teamster
and cook, kept the two gaunt, wild-looking horses trot-
ting steadily. Lambert and I rode to one side on our
unkempt cow-ponies, our rifles slung across the saddle
bows.
Our stock of fresh meat was getting low and we were
anxious to shoot something; but in the early hours of the
afternoon we saw no game. Small parties of horned larks
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 165
ran along the ground ahead of the wagon, twittering
plaintively as they rose, and now and then flocks of long-
spurs flew hither and thither; but of larger life we saw
nothing, save occasional bands of range horses. The
drought had been severe and we were far from the river,
so that we saw no horned stock. Horses can travel much
farther to water than cattle, and, when the springs dry
up, they stay much farther out on the prairie.
At last we did see a band of four antelope, lying in
the middle of a wide plain, but they saw us before we
saw them, and the ground was so barren of cover that it
was impossible to get near them. Moreover, they were
very shy and ran almost as soon as we got our eyes on
them. For an hour or two after this we jogged along
without seeing anything, while the gray clouds piled up
in the west and the afternoon began to darken ; then, just
after passing Saddle Butte, we struck a rough prairie
road, which we knew led to the P. K. ranch — a road very
faint in places, while in others the wheels had sunk deep
in the ground and made long, parallel ruts.
Almost immediately after striking this road, on top-
ping a small rise, we discovered a young prongbuck
standing ofif a couple of hundred yards to one side, gazing
at the wagon with that absorbed curiosity which in this
game so often conquers its extreme wariness and timidity,
to a certain extent offsetting the advantage conferred
upon it by its marvellous vision. The little antelope stood
broadside on, gazing at us out of its great bulging eyes,
the sharply contrasted browns and whites of its coat
showing plainly. Lambert and I leaped off our horses
1 66 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
immediately, and I knelt and pulled trigger; but the car-
tridge snapped, and the little buck, wheeling round, can-
tered off, the white hairs on its rump standing erect.
There was a strong cross-wind, almost a gale, blowing,
and Lambert's bullet went just behind him; off he went
at a canter, which changed to a breakneck gallop, as we
again fired; and he went out of sight unharmed, over the
crest of the rising ground in front. We ran after him as
hard as we could pelt up the hill, into a slight valley,
and then up another rise, and again got a glimpse of him
standing, but this time farther off than before; and again
our shots went wild.
' However, the antelope changed its racing gallop to
a canter while still in sight, going slower and slower, and,
what was rather curious, it did not seem much frightened.
We were naturally a good deal chagrined at our shooting
and wished to retrieve ourselves, if possible; so we ran
back to the wagon, got our horses and rode after the buck.
He had continued his flight in a straight line, gradually
slackening his pace, and a mile's brisk gallop enabled us
to catch a glimpse of him, far ahead and merely walking.
The wind was bad, and we decided to sweep off and try
to circle round ahead of him. Accordingly, we dropped
back, turned into a slight hollow to the right, and gal-
loped hard until we came to the foot of a series of low
buttes, when we turned more to the left; and, when we
judged that we were about across the antelope's line of
march, leaped from our horses, threw the reins over their
heads, and left them standing, while we stole up the near-
est rise ; and, when close to the top, took off our caps and
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 167
pushed ourselves forward, flat on our faces to peep over.
We had judged the distance well, for we saw the antelope
at once, now stopping to graze. Drawing back, we ran
along some little distance nearer, then drew up over the
same rise. He was only about 125 yards off, and this
time there was no excuse for my failing to get him; but
fail I did, and away the buck raced again, with both of
us shooting. My first two shots were misses, but I kept
correcting my aim and holding farther in front of the
flying beast. My last shot was taken just as the antelope
reached the edge of the broken country, in which he
would have been safe; and almost as I pulled the trigger
I had the satisfaction of seeing him pitch forward and,
after turning a complete somerset, lie motionless. I
had broken his neck. He had cost us a good many car-
tridges, and, though my last shot was well aimed, there
was doubtless considerable chance in my hitting him,
while there was no excuse at all for at least one of my
previous misses. Nevertheless, all old hunters know that
there is no other kind of shooting in which so many car-
tridges are expended for every head of game bagged.
As we knelt down to butcher the antelope, the clouds
broke and the rain fell. Hastily we took off the saddle
and hams, and, packing them behind us on our horses,
loped to the wagon in the teeth of the cold storm. When
we overtook it, after some sharp riding, we threw in the
meat, and not very much later, when the day was grow-
ing dusky, caught sight of the group of low ranch build-
ings toward which we had been headed. We were re-
ceived with warm hospitality, as one always is in a ranch
1 68 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
country. We dried our streaming clothes inside the
warm ranch house and had a good supper, and that night
we rolled up in our blankets and tarpaulins, and slept
soundly in the lee of a big haystack. The ranch house
stood in the winding bottom of a creek; the flanking hills
were covered with stunted cedar, while dwarf cotton-
wood and box elder grew by the pools in the half-dried
creek bed.
Next morning we had risen by dawn. The storm was
over, and it was clear and cold. Before sunrise we had
started. We were only some thirty miles away from my
ranch, and I directed the Sheriff how to go there, by strik-
ing east until he came to the main divide, and then fol-
lowing that down till he got past a certain big plateau,
when a turn to the right down any of the coulees would
bring him into the river bottom near the ranch house.
We wished ourselves to ride ofif to one side and try to
pick up another antelope. However, the Sheriff took the
wrong turn after getting to the divide, and struck the
river bottom some fifteen miles out of his way, so that
we reached the ranch a good many hours before he did.
When we left the wagon we galloped straight across
country, looking out from the divide across the great roll-
ing landscape, every feature standing clear through the
frosty air. Hour after hour we paced and loped on and
on over the grassy seas in the glorious morning. Once we
stopped, and I held the horses while Lambert stalked and
shot a fine prongbuck; then we tied his head and hams
to our saddles and again pressed forward along the divide.
We had hoped to get lunch at a spring that I knew of
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 169
some twelve miles from my ranch, but when we reache4
it we found it dry and went on without halting. Early
in the afternoon we came out on the broad, tree-clad bot-
tom on which the ranch house stands, and, threading our
way along the cattle trails soon drew up in front of the
gray empty buildings.
Just as we were leaving the hunting-grounds on this
trip, after having killed all the game we felt we had a
right to kill, we encountered bands of Sioux Indians from
the Standing Rock and Cheyenne River reservations com-
ing in to hunt, and I at once felt that the chances for much
future sport in that particular district were small. Ind-
ians are not good shots, but they hunt in large numbers,
killing everything, does, fawns and bucks alike, and they
follow the wounded animals with the utmost persever-
ance, so that they cause much destruction of game.
Accordingly, in 1894, when I started for these same
grounds, it was with some misgivings ; but I had time only
to make a few days' hunt, and I knew of no other accessi-
ble grounds where prongbuck were plentiful. My fore-
man was with me, and, as usual, we took the ranch wagon,
driven this time by a cowboy who had just come up
over the trail with cattle from Colorado. On reaching
our happy hunting-grounds of the previous season, I
found my fears sadly verified; and one unforeseen cir-
cumstance, also told against me. Not only had the Ind-
ians made a great killing of antelope the season before,
but in the spring one or two sheep men had moved into
the country. We found that the big flocks had been mov-
I/O AN AMERICAN HUNTER
ing from one spring pool to another, eating the pasturage
bare, while the shepherds whom we met — wild-looking
men on rough horses, each accompanied by a pair of fur-
tive sheep dogs — had taken every opportunity to get a
shot at antelope, so as to provide themselves with fresh
meat. Two days of fruitless hunting in this sheep-ridden
region was sufficient to show that the antelope were too
scarce and shy to give us hope for sport, and we shifted
quarters, a long day's journey, to the head of another
creek; and we had to go to yet another before we found
much game. As so often happens on such a trip, when
we started to have bad luck we had plenty. One night
two of the three saddle horses stampeded and went
straight as the crow flies back to the home range, so that
we did not get them until on our return from the trip.
On another occasion the team succeeded in breaking the
wagon pole; and as there was an entire absence of wood
where we were at the time, we had to make a splice for
it with the two tent poles and the picket ropes. Never-
theless, it was very enjoyable out on the great grassy
plains. Although we had a tent with us, I always slept
in the open in my buffalo bag, with the tarpaulin to pull
over me if it rained. On each night before going to sleep,
I lay for many minutes gazing at the stars above, or
watching the rising of the red moon, which was just at
or past the full.
We had plenty of fresh meat — prairie fowl and young
sage fowl at first, and antelope venison afterward. We
camped by little pools, generally getting fair water; and
from the camps where there was plenty of wood we took
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY
171
enough to build the fires at those where there was none.
The nights were frosty, and the days cool and pleasant,
and from sunrise to sunset we were ofif riding or walking
among the low hills and over the uplands, so that we slept
well and ate well, and felt the beat of hardy life in our
veins.
Much of the time we were on a high divide between
two creek systems, from which we could see the great
landmarks of all the regions roundabout. Sentinel Butte,
Square Butte and Middle Butte, far to the north and
east of us. Nothing could be more lonely and nothing
more beautiful than the view at nightfall across the
prairies to these huge hill masses, when the lengthening
shadows had at last merged into one and the faint after-
glow of the red sunset filled the west. The endless waves
of rolling prairie, sweeping, vast and dim, to the feet of
the great hills, grew purple as the evening darkened, and
the buttes loomed into vague, mysterious beauty as their
sharp outlines softened in the twilight.
Even when we got out of reach of the sheep men we
never found antelope very plentiful, and they were shy,
and the country was flat, so that the stalking was ex-
tremely difficult; yet I had pretty good sport. The first
animal I killed was a doe, shot for meat, because I had
twice failed to get bucks at which I emptied my maga-
zine at long range, and we were all feeling hungry for
venison. After that I killed nothing but bucks. Of the
five antelope killed, one I got by a headlong gallop to
cut off his line of flight. As sometimes happens with this
queer, erratic animal, when the buck saw that I was
172 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
trying to cut off his flight he simply raced ahead just
as hard as he knew how, and, as my pony was not fast,
he got to the little pass for which he was headed 200 yards
ahead of me. I then jumped off, and his curiosity made
him commit the fatal mistake of halting for a moment to
look round at me. He was standing end on, and offered
a very small mark at 200 yards; but I made a good line
shot, and, though I held a trifle too high, I hit him in
the head, and down he came. Another buck I shot from
under the wagon early one morning as he was passing
just beyond the picketed horses. I have several times
shot antelope which unexpectedly came into camp in this
fashion. The other three I got after much manoeuvring
and long, tedious stalks.
In some of the stalks, after infinite labor, and perhaps
after crawling on all-fours for an hour, or pulling my-
self flat on my face among some small sage-brush for ten
or fifteen minutes, the game took alarm and went off.
Too often, also, when I finally did get a shot, it was under
such circumstances that I missed. Sometimes the game
was too far; sometimes it had taken alarm and was
already in motion; sometimes the trouble could only be
ascribed to lack of straight powder, and I was covered
with shame as with a garment. Once in the afternoon
I had to spend so much time waiting for the antelope to
get into a favorable place that, when I got up close, I
found the light already so bad that my front sight glim-
mered indistinctly, and the bullet went wild. Another
time I met with one of those misadventures which are
especially irritating. It was at midday, and I made out
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 173
at a long distance a band of antelope lying for their noon
rest in a slight hollow. A careful stalk brought me up
within fifty yards of them. I was crawling flat on my
face, for the crest of the hillock sloped so gently that
this was the only way to get near them. At last, peering
through the grass, I saw the head of a doe. In a mo-
ment she saw me and jumped to her feet, and up stood
the whole band, including the buck. I immediately tried
to draw a bead on the latter, and to my horror found that,
lying flat as I was, and leaning on my elbows, I could not
bring the rifle above the tall shaking grass, and was ut-
terly unable to get a sight. In another second away tore
all the antelope. I jumped to my feet, took a snap shot
at the buck as he raced round a low-cut bank and missed,
and then walked drearily home, chewing the cud of my
ill-luck. Yet again in more than one instance, after mak-
ing a good stalk upon a band seen at some distance, I
found it contained only does and fawns, and would not
shoot at them.
Three times, however, the stalk was successful.
Twice I was out alone; the other time my foreman was
with me, and held my horse while I manoeuvred hither
and thither, and finally succeeded in getting into range.
In both the first instances I got a standing shot, but on
this last occasion, when my foreman was with me, two of
the watchful does which were in the band saw me before
I could get a shot at the old buck. I was creeping up
a low washout, and, by ducking hastily down again and
running back and up a side coulee, I managed to get
within long range of the band as they cantered off, not
174 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
yet thoroughly alarmed. The buck was behind, and I
held just ahead of him. He plunged to the shot, but
went off over the hill-crest. When I had panted up to
the ridge I found him dead just beyond.
One of the antelope I killed while I was out on foot
toward nightfall, a couple of miles from the wagon. I
saw the prongbuck quite half a mile off, and though I
dropped at once I was uncertain whether he had seen
me. He was in a little hollow or valley. A long, smooth-
ly sloping plateau led up to one edge of it. Across this
plateau I crawled, and when I thought I was near the
run I ventured slowly to look up, and almost immediately
saw vaguely through the tops of the long grasses what I
took to be the head and horns of the buck, looking in
my direction. There was no use in going back, and I
dropped flat on my face again and crawled another hun-
dred yards, until it was evident that I was on the rise
from which the plateau sank into the shallow valley be-
yond. Raising my head inch by inch, I caught sight of
the object toward which I had been crawling, and after
a moment's hesitation recognized it as a dead sunflower,
the stalks and blossoms so arranged as to be in a V shape.
Completely puzzled, I started to sit up, when by sheer
good luck I caught sight of the real prongbuck, still feed-
ing, some three hundred yards off, and evidently unaware
of my presence. It was feeding toward a slight hill to
my left. I crept off until behind this, and then walked
up until I was in line with a big bunch of weeds on its
shoulder. Crawling on all-fours to the weeds, I peeped
through and saw the prongbuck still slowly feeding my
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 175
way. When he was but seventy yards off, I sat up and
shot him; and trudged back to the wagon, carrying the
saddle and hams.
In packing an antelope or deer behind the saddle, I
cut slashes through the sinews of the legs just above the
joints; then I put the buck behind the saddle, run the
picket rope from the horn of the saddle, under the belly
of the horse, through the slashes in the legs on the other
side, bring the end back, swaying well down on it, and
fasten it to the horn ; then I repeat the same feat for the
other side. Packed in this way, the carcass always rides
steady, and cannot shake loose, no matter what antics the
horse may perform.
In the fall of 1896 I spent a fortnight on the range
with the ranch wagon. I was using for the first time one
of the new small-calibre, smokeless-powder rifles, with
the usual soft-nosed bullet. While travelling to and fro
across the range we usually moved camp each day, not
putting up the tent at all during the trip ; but at one
spot we spent three nights. It was in a creek bottom,
bounded on either side by rows of grassy hills, beyond
which stretched the rolling prairie. The creek bed,
which at this season was of course dry in most places,
wound in S-shaped curves, with here and there a pool
and here and there a fringe of stunted wind-beaten tim-
ber. We were camped near a little grove of ash, box-
elder, and willow, which gave us shade at noonday; and
there were two or three pools of good water in the creek
bed — one so deep that I made it my swimming-bath.
176 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
The first day that I was able to make a hunt I rode
out with my foreman, Sylvane Ferris. I was mounted
on Muley. Twelve years before, when Muley was my
favorite cutting pony on the round-up, he never seemed
to tire or lose his dash, but Muley was now sixteen years
old, and on ordinary occasions he liked to go as soberly
as possible; yet the good old pony still had the fire latent
in his blood, and at the sight of game — or, indeed, of
cattle or horses — he seemed to regain for the time being
all the headlong courage of his vigorous and supple
youth.
On the morning in question it was two or three hours
before Sylvane and I saw any game. Our two ponies
went steadily forward at a single-foot or shack, as the
cow-punchers term what Easterners call a " fox trot."
Most of the time we were passing over immense grassy
flats, where the mat of short curled blades lay brown
and parched under the bright sunlight. Occasionally we
came to ranges of low barren hills, which sent off gently
rounded spurs into the plain.
It was on one of these ranges that we first saw our
game. As we were travelling along the divide we spied
eight antelope far ahead of us. They saw us as soon
as we saw them, and the chance of getting to them seemed
small; but it was worth an effort, for by humoring them
when they started, so as to let them wheel and zigzag be-
fore they became really frightened, and then, when they
had settled into their run, by galloping toward them at
an angle oblique to their line of flight, there was always
some little chance of getting a shot. Sylvane was on a
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 177
light buckskin horse, and I left him on the ridge crest to
occupy their attention while I cantered off to one side.
The pronghorns became uneasy as I galloped away, and
ran off the ridge crest in a line nearly parallel to mine.
They did not go very fast, and I held in Muley, who
was all on fire at the sight of the game. After crossing
two or three spurs, the antelope going at half speed, they
found I had come closer to them, and turning, they ran
up one of the valleys between two spurs. Now was my
chance, and wheeling at right angles to my former course,
I galloped Muley as hard as I knew how up the valley
nearest and parallel to where the antelope had gone. The
good old fellow ran like a quarter-horse, and when we
were almost at the main ridge crest I leaped off, and ran
ahead with my rifle at the ready, crouching down as I
came to the sky-line. Usually on such occasions I find
that the antelope have gone on, and merely catch a
glimpse of them half a mile distant, but on this occasion
everything went right. The band had just reached the
ridge crest about 220 yards from me across the head of
the valley, and had halted for a moment to look around.
They were starting as I raised my rifle, but the trajectory
is very flat with these small-bore smokeless-powder weap-
ons, and taking a coarse front sight I fired at a young
buck which was broadside to me. There was no smoke,
and as the band raced away I saw him sink backward, the
ball having broken his hips.
We packed him bodily behind Sylvane on the buck-
skin and continued our ride, as there was no fresh meat
in camp, and we wished to bring in a couple of bucks
178 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
if possible. For two or three hours we saw nothing. The
unshod feet of the horses made hardly any noise on the
stretches of sun-cured grass, but now and then we passed
through patches of thin weeds, their dry stalks rattling
curiously, making a sound like that of a rattlesnake. At
last, coming over a gentle rise of ground, we spied two
more prongbucks, half a mile ahead of us and to our
right.
Again there seemed small chance of bagging our
quarry, but again fortune favored us. I at once can-
tered Muley ahead, not toward them, but so as to pass
them well on one side. After some hesitation they
started, not straight away, but at an angle to my own
course. For some moments I kept at a hand gallop, until
they got thoroughly settled in their line of flight; then
I touched Muley, and he went as hard as he knew how.
Immediately the two panic-stricken and foolish beasts
seemed to feel that I was cutting ofif their line of retreat,
and raced forward at mad speed. They went much faster
than I did, but I had the shorter course, and when they
crossed me they were not fifty yards ahead — by which
time I had come nearly a mile. At the pull of the rein
Muley stopped short, like the trained cow-pony he is;
I leaped off, and held well ahead of the rearmost and
largest buck. At the crack of the little rifle down he went
with his neck broken. In a minute or two he was packed
behind me on Muley, and we bent our steps toward
camp.
During the remainder of my trip we were never out
of fresh meat, for I shot three other bucks — one after a
HUNTING IN CATTLE COUNTRY 179
smart chase on horseback, and the other two after careful
stalks; and I missed two running shots.
The game being both scarce and shy, I had to exer-
cise much care, and after sighting a band I would some-
times have to wait and crawl round for two or three hours
before they would get into a position where I had any
chance of approaching. Even then they were more apt
to see me and go off than I was to get near them.
Antelope are the only game that can be hunted as
well at noonday as in the morning or evening, for their
times for sleeping and feeding are irregular. They never
seek shelter from the sun, and when they lie down for a
noonday nap they are apt to choose a hollow, so as to be
out of the wind ; in consequence, if the band is seen at all
at this time, it is easier to approach them than when they
are up and feeding. They sometimes come down to water
in the middle of the day, sometimes in the morning or
evening. On this trip I came across bands feeding and
resting at almost every hour of the day. They seemed
usually to rest for a couple of hours, then began feeding
again.
The last shot I got was when I was out with Joe Fer-
ris, in whose company I had killed my first buffalo, just
thirteen years before, and not very far from this same
spot. We had seen two or three bands that morning,
and in each case, after a couple of hours of useless effort,
I failed to get near enough. At last, toward midday,
after riding and tramping over a vast extent of broken
sun-scorched country, we got within range of a small
band lying down in a little cup-shaped hollow in the
i8o AN AMERICAN HUNTER
middle of a great flat. I did not have a close shot, for
they were running about i8o yards off. The buck was
rearmost, and at him I aimed ; the bullet struck him in the
flank, coming out of the opposite shoulder, and he fell
in his next bound. As we stood over him, Joe shook
his head, and said, " I guess that little rifle is the ace; "
and I told him I guessed so too.
CHAPTER V
A SHOT AT A MOUNTAIN SHEEP
In the fall of 1893 I was camped on the Little Mis-
souri, some ten miles below my ranch. The bottoms were
broad and grassy, and were walled in by curving rows of
high, steep bluf^fs. Back of them lay a mass of broken
country, in many places almost impassable for horses.
The wagon was drawn up on the edge of the fringe of
tall cottonwoods which stretched along the brink of the
shrunken river. The weather had grown cold, and at
night the frost gathered thickly on our sleeping-bags.
Great flocks of sandhill cranes passed overhead from time
to time, the air resounding with their strange, musical,
guttural clangor.
For several days we had hunted perseveringly, but
without success, through the broken country. We had
come across tracks of mountain sheep, but not the animals
themselves, and the few blacktail which we had seen had
seen us first and escaped before we could get within shot.
The only thing killed had been a young whitetail, which
Lambert, who was with me, had knocked over by a very
pretty shot as we were riding through a long, heavily-
timbered bottom. Four men in stalwart health and tak-
ing much out-door exercise have large appetites, and the
flesh of the whitetail was almost gone.
181
1 82 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
One evening Lambert and I hunted nearly to the head
of one of the creeks which opened close to our camp, and,
in turning to descend what we thought was one of the
side coulees leading into it, we contrived to get over the
divide into the coulees of an entirely different creek sys-
tem, and did not discover our error until it was too late
to remedy it. We struck the river about nightfall, and
were not quite sure where, and had six miles' tramp in
the dark along the sandy river bed and through the dense
timber bottoms, wading the stream a dozen times before
we finally struck camp, tired and hungry, and able to ap-
preciate to the full the stew of hot venison and potatoes,
and afterward the comfort of our buffalo and caribou
hide sleeping-bags. The next morning the Sheriff's re-
mark of " Look alive, you fellows, if you want any break-
fast," awoke the other members of the party shortly after
dawn. It was bitterly cold as we scrambled out of our
bedding, and, after a hasty wash, huddled around the fire,
where the venison was sizzling and the coffee-pot boiling,
while the bread was kept warm in the Dutch oven.
About a third of a mile away to the west the bluffs, which
rose abruptly from the river bottom, were crowned by
a high plateau, where the grass was so good that over-
night the horses had been led up and picketed on it, and
the man who had led them up had stated the previous
evening that he had seen what he took to be fresh foot-
prints of a mountain sheep crossing the surface of a bluflf
fronting our camp. From the footprints it appeared that
the animal had been there since the camp was pitched.
The face of the blufif on this side was very sheer, the path
A SHOT AT A MOUNTAIN SHEEP 183
by which the horses scrambled to the top being around
a shoulder and out of sight of camp.
While sitting close around the fire finishing break-
fast, and just as the first level sunbeams struck the top
of the plateau, we saw on this cliff crest something mov-
ing, and at first supposed it to be one of the horses which
had broken loose from its picket pin. Soon the thing,
whatever it was, raised its head, and we were all on our
feet in a moment, exclaiming that it was a deer or a
sheep. It was feeding in plain sight of us only about a
third of a mile distant, and the horses, as I afterward
found, were but a few rods beyond it on the plateau. The
instant I realized that it was game of some kind I seized
my rifle, buckled on my cartridge-belt, and slunk off tow-
ard the river bed. As soon as I was under the protection
of the line of cottonwoods, I trotted briskly toward the
cliff, and when I got up to where it impinged on the
river I ran a little to the left, and, selecting what I deemed
to be a favorable place, began to make the ascent. The
animal was on a grassy bench, some eight or ten feet be-
low the crest, when I last saw it; but it was evidently
moving hither and thither, sometimes on this bench and
sometimes on the crest itself, cropping the short grass
and browsing on the young shrubs. The cliff was divided
by several shoulders or ridges, there being hollows like
vertical gullies between them, and up one of these I
scrambled, using the utmost caution not to dislodge earth
or stones. Finally I reached the bench just below the sky-
line, and then, turning to the left, wriggled cautiously
along it, hat in hand. The cliff was so steep and bulged
1 84 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
so in the middle, and, moreover, the shoulders or project-
ing ridges in the surface spoken of above were so pro-
nounced, that I knew^ it w^as out of the question for the
animal to have seen me, but I was afraid it might have
heard me. The air was absolutely still, and so I had no
fear of its sharp nose. Twice in succession I peered with
the utmost caution around shoulders of the cliff, merely
to see nothing beyond save another shoulder some forty
or fifty yards distant. Then I crept up to the edge and
looked over the level plateau. Nothing was in sight ex-
cepting the horses, and these were close up to me, and, of
course, they all raised their heads to look. I nervously
turned half round, sure that if the animal, whatever it
was, was in sight, it would promptly take the alarm.
However, by good luck, it appeared that at this time it
was below the crest on the terrace or bench already men-
tioned, and, on creeping to the next shoulder, I at last
saw it — a yearling mountain sheep — walking slowly away
from me, and evidently utterly unsuspicious of any dan-
ger. I straightened up, bringing my rifle to my shoulder,
and as it wheeled I fired, and the sheep made two or three
blind jumps in my direction. So close was I to the camp,
and so still was the cold morning, that I distinctly heard
one of the three men, who had remained clustered about
the fire eagerly watching my movements, call, " By
George, he's missed! I saw the bullet strike the clifif."
I had fired behind the shoulders, and the bullet, going
through, had buried itself in the bluff beyond. The
wound was almost instantaneously fatal, and the sheep,
after striving in vain to keep its balance, fell heels over
A SHOT AT A MOUNTAIN SHEEP 185
head down a crevice, where it jammed. I descended,
released the carcass, and pitched it on ahead of me, only
to have it jam again near the foot of the clifif. Before
I got it loose I was joined by my three companions, who
had been running headlong toward me through the brush
ever since the time they had seen the animal fall.
I never obtained another sheep under circumstances
which seemed to me quite so remarkable as these; for
sheep are, on the whole, the wariest of game. Neverthe-
less, with all game there is an immense amount of chance
in the chase, and it is perhaps not wholly uncharacteristic
of a hunter's luck that, after having hunted faithfully in
vain and with much hard labor for several days through
a good sheep country, we should at last have obtained
one within sight and earshot of camp. Incidentally I
may mention that I have never tasted better mutton, or
meat of any kind, than that furnished by this tender
yearling.
The nomenclature and exact specific relationships of
American sheep, deer and antelope offer difficulties not
only to the hunter but to the naturalist. As regards the
nomenclature, we share the trouble encountered by all
peoples of European descent who have gone into strange
lands. The incomers are almost invariably men who are
not accustomed to scientific precision of expression. Like
other people, they do not like to invent names if they
can by any possibility make use of those already in ex-
istence, and so in a large number of cases they call the
new birds and animals by names applied to entirely dif-
ferent birds and animals of the Old World to which, in
1 86 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the eyes of the settlers, they bear some resemblance. In
South America the Spaniards, for instance, christened
"lion" and "tiger" the great cats which are properly
known as cougar and jaguar. In South Africa the Dutch
settlers, who came from a land where all big game had
long been exterminated, gave fairly grotesque names to
the great antelopes, calling them after the European elk,
stag, and chamois. The French did but little better in
Canada. Even in Ceylon the English, although belong-
ing for the most part to the educated classes, did no better
than the ordinary pioneer settlers, miscalling the sambur
stag an elk, and the leopard a cheetah. Our own pioneers
behaved in the same way. Hence it is that we have no
distinctive name at all for the group of peculiarly Ameri-
can game birds of which the bobwhite is the typical rep-
resentative; and that, when we could not use the words
quail, partridge, or pheasant, we went for our termi-
nology to the barn-yard, and called our fine grouse, fool-
hens, sage-hens, and prairie-chickens. The bear and wolf
our people recognized at once. The bison they called a
buffalo, which was no worse than the way in which in
Europe the Old World bison was called an aurochs.
The American true elk and reindeer were rechristened
moose and caribou — excellent names, by the way, de-
rived from the Indian. The huge stag was called an elk.
The extraordinary antelope of the high Western peaks
was christened the white goat; not unnaturally, as it has
a most goatlike look. The prongbuck of the plains, an
animal standing entirely alone among ruminants, was
simply called antelope. Even when we invented names
A SHOT AT A MOUNTAIN SHEEP 187
for ourselves, we applied them loosely. The ordinary
deer is sometimes known as the red deer, sometimes as
the Virginia deer, and sometimes as the whitetail deer —
the last being by far the best and most distinctive term.
In the present condition of zoological research it is
not possible to state accurately how many *' species " of
deer and sheep there are in North America, both because
mammalogists have not at hand a sufficient amount of
material in the way of large series of specimens from dif-
ferent localities, and because they are not agreed among
themselves as to the value of " species," or indeed as to
exactly what is denoted by the term. Of course, if we
had a complete series of specimens of extinct and fossil
deer before us, there would be a perfect intergradation
among all the existing forms through their long-vanished
ancestral types, as the existing gaps have been created by
the extinction and transformation of those former types.
Where the gap is very broad and well marked no dif-
ficulty exists in using terms which shall express the dif-
ference. Thus the gap separating the moose, the caribou,
and the wapiti from one another, and from the smaller
American deer, is so wide, and there is so complete a lack
of transitional forms, that the differences among them are
expressed by naturalists by the use of different generic
terms. The gap between the whitetail and the different
forms of blacktail, though much less, is also clearly
marked. But when we come to consider the blacktail
among themselves, we find two very distinct types which
yet show a certain tendency to intergrade; and with the
whitetail very wide differences exist, even in the United
i88 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
States, both individually among the deer of certain locali-
ties, and also as between all the deer of one locality when
compared with all the deer of another. Our present
knowledge of the various forms hardly justifies us in dog-
matizing as to their exact relative worth; and even if our
knowledge was more complete, naturalists are as yet
wholly at variance as to the laws which should govern
specific nomenclature. However, the hunter, the mere
field naturalist, and the lover of out-door life, are only
secondarily interested in the niceness of these distinc-
tions.
In addition to being a true sportsman and not a game
butcher, in addition to being a humane man as well as
keen-eyed, strong-limbed, and stout-hearted, the big
game hunter should be a field naturalist. If possible,
he should be an adept with the camera; and hunting with
the camera will tax his skill far more than hunting with
the rifle, while the results in the long run give much
greater satisfaction. Wherever possible he should keep
a note-book, and should carefully study and record the
habits of the wild creatures, especially when in some
remote regions to which trained scientific observers but
rarely have access. If we could only produce a hunter
who would do for American big game what John Bur-
roughs has done for the smaller wild life of hedgerow
and orchard, farm and garden and grove, we should in-
deed be fortunate. Yet even though a man does not
possess the literary faculty and the powers of trained
observation necessary for such a task, he can do his part
toward adding to our information by keeping careful
A SHOT AT A MOUNTAIN SHEEP 189
notes of all the important facts which he comes across.
Such note-books would show the changed habits of game
with the changed seasons, their abundance at different
times and dififerent places, the melancholy data of their
disappearance, the pleasanter facts as to their change
of habits which enable them to continue to exist in the
land, and, in short, all their traits. A real and lasting
service would thereby be rendered not only to naturalists,
but to all who care for nature.
Along the Little Missouri there have been several
curious changes in the fauna within my own knowledge.
Thus magpies have greatly decreased in numbers. This
is, I believe, owing to the wolf hunters, for magpies often
come around carcasses and pick up poisoned baits. I
have seen as many as seven lying dead around a bait.
They are much less plentiful than they formerly were.
In 1894 I was rather surprised at meeting a porcupine,
usually a beast of the timber, at least twenty miles from
trees. He was grubbing after sage-brush roots on the edge
of a cut bank by a half-dried creek. I was stalking an
antelope at the time, and stopped to watch him for about
five minutes. He paid no heed to me, though I was
within three or four paces of him. Porcupines are easily
exterminated; and they have diminished in numbers in
this neighborhood. Both the lucivee, or northern lynx,
and the wolverene have been found on the Little Mis-
souri, near the Kildeer Mountains, but I do not know
of a specimen of either that has been killed there for
some years past. Bobcats are still not uncommon. The
blackfooted ferret was always rare, and is rare now. But
190
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
few beaver are left; they were very abundant in 1880,
but were speedily trapped out when the Indians vanished
and the Northern Pacific Railroad was built. While
this railroad was building, the beaver frequently caused
much trouble by industriously damming the culverts.
With us the first animal to disappear was the buffalo.
In the old days, say from 1870 to 1880, the buffalo were
probably the most abundant of all animals along the Lit-
tle Missouri in the region that I know, ranging, say, from
Pretty Buttes to. the Kildeer Mountains. They were mi-
gratory, and at times almost all of them might leave; but,
on the whole, they were the most abundant of the game
animals. In 1881 they were still almost as numerous as
ever. In 1883 all were killed but a few stragglers, and
the last of these stragglers that I heard of as seen in our
immediate neighborhood was in 1885. The second game
animal in point of abundance was the blacktail. It did not
go out on the prairies, but in the broken country adjoining
the river it was far more plentiful than any other kind of
game. Blacktail were not much slaughtered until the
buffalo began to give out, say in 1882; but by 1896 they
were not a twentieth — probably not a fiftieth — as plenti-
ful as they had been in 1882. A few are still found in
out-of-the-way places, where the ground is very rough.
Elk were plentiful in 1880, though never anything like
as abundant as the buffalo and the blacktail. Only strag-
gling parties or individuals have been seen since 1883.
The last I shot near my ranch was in 1886; but two or
three have been shot since, and a cow and calf were seen,
chased and almost roped by the riders on the round-up
A SHOT AT A MOUNTAIN SHEEP 191
in the fall of 1892. Whitetail were never as numer-
ous as the other game, but they held their own better,
and a few can be shot yet. In 1883 probably twenty
blacktail were killed for every one whitetail; in 1896
the numbers were about equal. Antelope were plenti-
ful in the old days, though not nearly so much so as the
buffalo and blacktail. The hunters did not molest them
while the buffalo and elk lasted, and they then turned
their attention to the blacktail. For some years after
1883 I think the pronghorn in our neighborhood posi-
tively increased in numbers. In 1886 I thought them
more plentiful than I had ever known them before.
Then they decreased; after 1893 ^^^ decrease was rapid.
A few still remain. Mountain sheep were never very
plentiful, and decreased proportionately with less rapid-
ity than any other game; but they are now almost exter-
minated. Bears likewise were never plentiful, and cou-
gars were always scarce.
There were two stages of hunting in this country, as
in almost all other countries similarly situated. In 1880
the Northern Pacific Railroad was built nearly to the
edge of the Bad Lands, and the danger of Indian war
was totally eliminated. A great inrush of hunters fol-
lowed. In 1881, 1882 and 1883 buffalo, elk and black-
tail were slaughtered in enormous numbers, and a good
many whitetail and prongbuck were killed too. By 1884
the game had been so thinned out that hide-hunting and
meat-hunting ceased to pay. A few professional hunt-
ers remained, but most of them moved elsewhere, or
were obliged to go into other business. From that time
192 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the hunting has chiefly been done by ranchers and occa-
sional small grangers. In consequence, for six or eight
years the game about held its own — the antelope, as I
have said above, at one time increasing; but the gradual
growth in the number of actual settlers then began to tell,
and the game became scarce. Nowadays settlers along
the Little Missouri can kill an occasional deer or ante-
lope; but it can hardly be called a game country.
CHAPTER VI
THE WHITETAIL DEER
The whitetail deer is now, as it always has been, the
most plentiful and most widely distributed of American
big game. It holds its own in the land better than any
other species, because it is by choice a dweller in the
thick forests and swamps, the places around which the
tide of civilization flows, leaving them as islets of refuge
for the wild creatures which formerly haunted all the
country. The range of the whitetail is from the Atlantic
to the Pacific, and from the Canadian to the Mexican
borders, and somewhat to the north and far to the south
of these limits. The animal shows a wide variability,
both individually and locally, within these confines; from
the hunter's standpoint it is not necessary to try to deter-
mine exactly the weight that attaches to these local varia-
tions.
There is also a very considerable variation in habits.
As compared with the mule-deer, the whitetail is not
a lover of the mountains. As compared with the prong-
buck, it is not a lover of the treeless plains. Yet in the
Alleghanies and the Adirondacks, at certain seasons espe-
cially, and in some places at all seasons, it dwells high
among the densely wooded mountains, wandering over
their crests and sheer sides, and through the deep ravines;
193
194 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
while in the old days there were parts of Texas and the
Indian Territory where it was found in great herds far
out on the prairie. Moreover, the peculiar nature of its
chosen habitat, while generally enabling it to resist the
onslaught of man longer than any of its fellows, some-
times exposes it to speedy extermination. To the west-
ward of the rich bottom-lands and low prairies of the
Mississippi Valley proper, when the dry plains country
is reached, the natural conditions are much less favorable
for whitetail than for other big game. The black bear,
which in the East has almost precisely the same habitat
as the whitetail, disappears entirely on the great plains,
and reappears in the Rockies in regions which the white-
tail does not reach. All over the great plains, into the
foothills of the Rockies, the whitetail is found, but only
in the thick timber of the river bottoms. Throughout
the regions of the Upper Missouri and Upper Platte, the
Big Horn, Powder, Yellowstone, and Cheyenne, over all
of which I have hunted, the whitetail lives among the
Cottonwood groves and dense brush growth that fringe
the river beds and here and there extend some distance
up the mouths of the large creeks. In these places the
whitetail and the mule-deer may exist in close proximity;
but normally neither invades the haunts of the other.
Along the ordinary plains river, such as the Little
Missouri, where I ranched for many years, there are
three entirely different types of country through which
a man passes as he travels away from the bed of the river.
There is first the alluvial river bottom covered with
Cottonwood and box-elder, together with thick brush.
THE WHITETAIL DEER
195
These bottoms may be a mile or two across, or they may
shrink to but a few score yards. After the extermination
of the wapiti, which roamed everywhere, the only big
game animal found in them was the whitetail deer.
Beyond this level alluvial bottom the ground changes
abruptly to bare, rugged hills or fantastically carved and
shaped Bad Lands rising on either side of the river, the
ravines, coulees, creeks, and canyons twisting through
them in every direction. Here there are patches of ash,
cedar, pine, and occasionally other trees, but the country
is very rugged, and the cover very scanty. This is the
home of the mule-deer, and, in the roughest and wildest
parts, of the bighorn. The absolutely clear and sharply
defined line of demarkation between this rough, hilly
country, flanking the river, and the alluvial river bottom,
serves as an equally clearly marked line of demarkation
between the ranges of the whitetail and the mule-deer.
This belt of broken country may be only a few hundred
yards in width; or it may extend for a score of miles
before it changes into the open prairies, the high plains
proper. As soon as these are reached, the prongbuck's
domain begins.
As the plains country is passed, and the vast stretches
of mountainous region entered, the river bottoms become
narrower, and the plains on which the prongbuck is found
become of very limited extent, shrinking to high valleys
and plateaus, while the mass of rugged foothills and
mountains add immensely to the area of the mule-deer's
habitat.
Given equal areas of country, of the three different
196 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
types alluded to above, that in which the mule-deer is
found offers the greatest chance of success to the rifle-
bearing hunter, because there is enough cover to shield
him and not enough to allow his quarry to escape by
stealth and hiding. On the other hand, the thick river
bottoms offer him the greatest difficulty. In consequence,
where the areas of distribution of the different game ani-
mals are about equal, the mule-deer disappears first be-
fore the hunter, the prongbuck next, while the whitetail
holds out the best of all. I saw this frequently on the Yel-
lowstone, the Powder, and the Little Missouri. When
the ranchmen first came into this country the mule-deer
swarmed, and yielded a far more certain harvest to the
hunter than did either the prongbuck or the whitetail.
They were the first to be thinned out, the prongbuck last-
ing much better. The cowboys and small ranchmen,
most of whom did not at the time have hounds, then
followed the prongbuck; and this, in its turn, was killed
out before the whitetail. But in other places a slight
change in the conditions completely reversed the order
of destruction. In parts of Wyoming and Montana the
mountainous region where the mule-deer dwelt was of
such vast extent, and the few river bottoms on which the
whitetail were found were so easily hunted, that the
whitetail was completely exterminated throughout large
districts where the mule-deer continued to abound.
Moreover, in these regions the table-lands and plains
upon which the prongbuck was found were limited in
extent, and although the prongbuck outlasted the white-
tail, it vanished long before the herds of the mule-deer
THE WHITETAIL DEER 197
had been destroyed from among the neighboring moun-
tains.
The whitetail was originally far less common in the
forests of northern New England than was the moose,
for in the deep snows the moose had a much better chance
to escape from its brute foes and to withstand cold and
starvation. But when man appeared upon the scene he
followed the moose so much more eagerly than he fol-
lowed the deer that the conditions were reversed and the
moose was killed out. The moose thus vanished entirely
from the Adirondacks, and almost entirely from Maine;
but the excellent game laws of the latter State, and the
honesty and efficiency with which they have been exe-
cuted during the last twenty years, have resulted in an
increase of moose during that time. During the same
period the whitetail deer has increased to an even greater
extent. It is doubtless now more plentiful in New York
and New England than it was a quarter of a century
ago. Stragglers are found in Connecticut, and, what is
still more extraordinary, even occasionally come into
wild parts of densely populated little Rhode Island — my
authority for the last statement being Mr. C. Grant
La Farge. Of all our wild game, the whitetail responds
most quickly to the efforts for its protection, and except
the wapiti, it thrives best in semi-domestication; in con-
sequence, it has proved easy to preserve it, even in such
places as Cape Cod in Massachusetts and Long Island
in New York; while it has increased greatly in Vermont,
New Hampshire, and Maine, and has more than held
its own in the Adirondacks. Mr. James R. Sheffield,
198 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
of New York City, in the summer of 1899, spent several
weeks on a fishing trip through northern Maine. He
kept count of the moose and deer he saw, and came
across no less than thirty- five of the former and over five
hundred and sixty of the latter. In the most lonely parts
of the forest deer were found by the score, feeding in
broad daylight on the edges of the ponds. Deer are still
plentiful in many parts of the Alleghany Mountains,
from Pennsylvania southward, and also in the swamps
and canebrakes of the South Atlantic and Gulf States.
Where the differences in habitat and climate are so
great there are many changes of habits, and some of them
of a noteworthy kind. Mr. John A. Mcllhenny, of
Avery's Island, Louisiana, formerly a lieutenant in my
regiment, lives in what is still a fine game country. His
plantation is in the delta of the Mississippi, among the
vast marshes, north of which lie the wooded swamps.
Both the marshes and the swamps were formerly literally
thronged with whitetail deer, and the animals are still
plentiful in them. Mr. Mcllhenny has done much deer-
hunting, always using hounds. He informs me that the
breeding times are unexpectedly different from those of
the northern deer. In the North, in different localities,
the rut takes place in October or November, and the
fawns are dropped in May or June. In the Louisiana
marshes around Avery's Island the rut begins early in
July and the fawns are dropped in February. In the
swamps immediately north of these marshes the dates are
fully a month later. The marshes are covered with tall
reeds and grass and broken by bayous, while there are
THE WHITETAIL DEER 199
scattered over them what are called " islands " of firmer
ground overgrown with timber. In this locality the deer
live in the same neighborhood all the year round, just as,
for instance, they do on Lon^ Island. So on the Little
Missouri, in the neighborhood of my ranch, they lived in
exactly the same localities throughout the entire year.
Occasionally they would shift from one river bottom to
another, or go a few miles up or down stream because of
scarcity of food. But there was no general shifting.
On the Little Missouri, in one place where they were
not molested, I knew a particular doe and fawn with
whose habits I became quite intimately acquainted.
When the moon was full they fed chiefly by night, and
spent most of the day lying in the thick brush. When
there was little or no moon they would begin to feed early
in the morning, then take a siesta, and then — what struck
me as most curious of all — would go to a little willow-
bordered pool about noon to drink, feeding for some time
both before and after drinking. After another siesta they
would come out late in the afternoon and feed until dark.
In the Adirondacks the deer often completely alter
their habits at different seasons. Soon after the fawns
are born they come down to the water's edge, preferring
the neighborhood of the lakes, but also haunting the
stream banks. The next three months, during the hot
weather, they keep very close to the water, and get a large
proportion of their food by wading in after the lilies and
other aquatic plants. Where they are much hunted, they
only come to the water's edge after dark, but in regions
where they are little disturbed they are quite as often
200 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
diurnal in their habits. I have seen dozens feeding in
the neighborhood of a lake, some of them two or three
hundred yards out in shallow places, up to their bellies;
and this after sunrise, or two or three hours before sunset.
Before September the deer cease coming to the water,
and go back among the dense forests and on the moun-
tains. There is no genuine migration, as in the case of
the mule-deer, from one big tract to another, and no en-
tire desertion of any locality. But the food supply which
drew the animals to the water's edge during the summer
months shows signs of exhaustion toward fall ; the deli-
cate water-plants have vanished, the marsh-grass is dying,
and the lilies are less succulent. An occasional deer still
wanders along the shores or out into the lake, but most
of them begin to roam the woods, eating the berries and
the leaves and twig ends of the deciduous trees, and even
of some of the conifers — although a whitetail is fond of
grazing, especially upon the tips of the grass. I have
seen moose feeding on the tough old lily stems and wad-
ing after them when the ice had skimmed the edges of
the pool. But the whitetail has usually gone back into
the woods long before freezing-time.
From Long Island south there is not enough snow to
make the deer alter their habits in the winter. As soon
as the rut is over, which in diflferent localities may be
from October to December, whitetail are apt to band to-
gether — more apt than at any other season, although even
then they are often found singly or in small parties.
While nursing, the does have been thin, and at the end
of the rut the bucks are gaunt, with their necks swollen
THE WHITETAIL DEER 201
and distended. From that time on bucks and does alike
put on flesh very rapidly in preparation for the winter.
Where there is no snow, or not enough to interfere with
their travelling, they continue to roam an)rwhere through
the woods and across the natural pastures and meadows,
eating twigs, buds, nuts, and the natural hay which is
cured on the stalk.
In the Northern woods they form yards during the
winter. These yards are generally found in a hardwood
growth which offers a supply of winter food, and consist
simply of a tangle of winding trails beaten out through
the snow by the incessant passing and repassing of the
animal. The yard merely enables the deer to move along
the various paths in order to obtain food. If there are
many deer together, the yards may connect by interlacing
paths, so that a deer can run a considerable distance
through them. Often, however, each deer will yard by
itself, as food is the prime consideration, and a given
locality may only have enough to support a single animal.
When the snows grow deep the deer is wholly unable to
move, once the yard is left, and hence it is absolutely at
the mercy of a man on snow-shoes, or of a cougar or a
wolf, if found at such times. The man on snow-shoes
can move very comfortably; and the cougar and the wolf,
although hampered by the snow, are not rendered help-
less like the deer. I have myself scared a deer out of a
yard, and seen it flounder helplessly in a great drift be-
fore it had gone thirty rods. When I came up close it
ploughed its way a very short distance through the drifts,
making tremendous leaps. But as the snow was over six
202 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
feet deep, so that the deer sank below the level of the sur-
face at each jump, and yet could not get its feet on the
solid ground, it became so exhausted that it fell over on
its side and bleated in terror as I came up. After looking
at it I passed on. Hide-hunters and frontier settlers some-
times go out after the deer on snow-shoes when there is
a crust, and hence this method of killing is called crust-
ing. It is simple butchery, for the deer cannot, as the
moose does, cause its pursuer a chase which may last
days. No self-respecting man would follow this method
of hunting save from the necessity of having meat.
In very wild localities deer sometimes yard on the ice
along the edges of lakes, eating off all the twigs and
branches, whether of hardwood trees or of conifers,
which they can reach.
At the beginning of the rut the does flee from the
bucks, which follow them by scent at full speed. The
whitetail buck rarely tries to form a herd of does, though
he will sometimes gather two or three. The mere fact
that his tactics necessitate a long and arduous chase after
each individual doe prevents his organizing herds as the
wapiti bull does. Sometimes two or three bucks will be
found strung out one behind the other, following the
same doe. The bucks wage desperate battle among them-
selves during this season, coming together with a clash,
and then pushing and straining for an hour or two at a
time, with their mouths open, until the weakest gives way.
As soon as one abandons the fight he flees with all possible
speed, and usually escapes unscathed. While head to
head there is no opportunity for a disabling thrust, but
THE WHITETAIL DEER 203
if, in the effort to retreat, the beaten buck gets caught,
he may be killed. Owing to the character of the antlers,
whitetail bucks are peculiarly apt to get them interlocked
in such a fight, and if the efforts of the two beasts fail to
disentangle them, both ultimately perish by starvation.
I have several times come across a pair of skulls with
interlocked antlers. The same thing occurs, though far
less frequently, to the mule-deer and even the wapiti.
The whitetail is the most beautiful and graceful of
all our game animals when in motion. I have never been
able to agree with Judge Caton that the mule-deer is
clumsy and awkward in his gait. I suppose all such terms
are relative. Compared to the moose or caribou the
mule-deer is light and quick in his movements, and to
me there is something very attractive in the poise and
power with which one of the great bucks bounds off, all
four legs striking the earth together and shooting the
body upward and forward as if they were steel springs.
But there can be no question as to the infinitely superior
grace and beauty of the whitetail when he either trots
or runs. The mule-deer and blacktail bound, as already
described. The prongbuck gallops with an even gait,
and so does the bighorn, when it happens to be caught
on a flat; but the whitetail moves with an indescribable
spring and buoyancy. If surprised close up, and much
terrified, it simply runs away as hard as it can, at a gait
not materially different from that of any other game
animal under like circumstances, while its head is thrust
forward and held down, and the tail is raised perpendic-
ularly. But normally its mode of progression, whether
204 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
it trots or gallops, is entirely unique. In trotting, the head
and tail are both held erect, and the animal throws out
its legs with a singularly proud and free motion, bringing
the feet well up, while at every step there is an inde-
scribable spring. In the canter or gallop the head and
tail are also held erect, the flashing white brush being
very conspicuous. Three or four low, long, marvellously
springy bounds are taken, and then a great leap is made
high in the air, which is succeeded by three or four low
bounds, and then by another high leap. A whitetail
going through the brush in this manner is a singularly
beautiful sight. It has been my experience that they are
not usually very much frightened by an ordinary slow
trackhound, and I have seen a buck play along in front
of one, alternately trotting and cantering, head and flag
up, and evidently feeling very little fear.
To my mind the chase of the whitetail, as it must
usually be carried on, offers less attraction than the chase
of any other kind of our large game. But this is a
mere matter of taste, and such men as Judge Caton and
Mr. George Bird Grinnell have placed it above all others
as a game animal. Personally I feel that the chase of any
animal has in it two chief elements of attraction. The
first is the chance given to be in the wilderness; to see
the sights and hear the sounds of wild nature. The sec-
ond is the demand made by the particular kind of chase
upon the qualities of manliness and hardihood. As re-
gards the first, some kinds of game, of course, lead the
hunter into particularly remote and wild localities; and
the farther one gets into the wilderness, the greater is the
THE WHITETAIL DEER 205
attraction of its lonely freedom. Yet to camp out at all
implies some measure of this delight. The keen, fresh
air, the breath of the pine forests, the glassy stillness of
the lake at sunset, the glory of sunrise among the moun-
tains, the shimmer of the endless prairies, the ceaseless
rustle of the cottonwood leaves where the wagon is drawn
up on the low bluff of the shrunken river — all these ap-
peal intensely to any man, no matter what may be the
game he happens to be following. But there is a wide
variation, and indeed contrast, in the qualities called for
in the chase itself, according as one quarry or another
is sought.
The qualities that make a good soldier are, in large
part, the qualities that make a good hunter. Most impor-
tant of all is the ability to shift for one's self, the mixture
of hardihood and resourcefulness which enables a man
to tramp all day in the right direction, and, when night
comes, to make the best of whatever opportunities for
shelter and warmth may be at hand. Skill in the use
of the rifle is another trait; quickness in seeing game,
another; ability to take advantage of cover, yet another;
while patience, endurance, keenness of observation, res-
olution, good nerves, and instant readiness in an emer-
gency, are all indispensable to a really good hunter.
If a man lives on a ranch, or is passing some weeks
in a lodge in a game country, and starts out for two or
three days, he will often do well to carry nothing what-
ever but a blanket, a frying-pan, some salt pork, and some
hardtack. If the hunting-ground is such that he can use
a wagon or a canoe, and the trip is not to be too long.
2o6 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
he can carry about anything he chooses, including a tent,
any amount of bedding, and if it is very cold, a small,
portable stove, not to speak of elaborate cooking ap-
paratus. If he goes with a pack-train, he will also be
able to carry a good deal ; but in such a case he must rely
on the judgment of the trained packers, unless he is him-
self an expert in the diamond hitch. If it becomes nec-
essary to go on foot for any length of time, he must be
prepared to do genuine roughing, and must get along
with the minimum of absolute necessities.
It is hardly necessary to point out that the hunter
worthy of the name should be prepared to shift for him-
self in emergencies. A ranchman, or any other man
whose business takes him much in the mountains and out
on the great plains or among the forests, ought to be
able to get along entirely on his own account. But this
cannot usually be done by those whose existence is habit-
ually more artificial. When a man who normally lives
a rather over-civilized life, an over-luxurious life — espe-
cially in the great cities — gets ofif for a few weeks' hunt-
ing, he cannot expect to accomplish much in the way of
getting game without calling upon the services of a
trained guide, woodsman, plainsman, or mountain man,
whose life-work it has been to make himself an adept
in all the craft of the wilderness. Until a man unused to
wilderness life, even though a good sportsman, has act-
ually tried it, he has no idea of the difficulties and hard-
ships of shifting absolutely for himself, even for only two
or three days. Not only will the local guide have the
necessary knowledge as to precisely which one of two
THE WHITETAIL DEER 207
seemingly similar places is most apt to contain game;
not only will he possess the skill in packing horses, or
handling a canoe in rough water, or finding his way
through the wilderness, which the amateur must lack;
but even the things which the amateur does, the profes-
sional will do so much more easily and rapidly, as in the
one case to leave, and in the other case not to leave,
ample time for the hunting proper. Therefore the or-
dinary amateur sportsman, especially if he lives in a
city, must count upon the services of trained men, possi-
bly to help him in hunting, certainly to help him in trav-
elling, cooking, pitching camp, and the like; and this
he must do, if he expects to get good sport, no matter
how hardy he may be, and no matter how just may be
the pride he ought to take in his own craft, skill, and
capacity to undergo fatigue and exposure. But while
normally he must take advantage of the powers of others,
he should certainly make a point of being able to shift
for himself whenever the need arises; and he can only
be sure of possessing this capacity by occasionally exer-
cising it. It ought to be unnecessary to point out that
the wilderness is not a place for those who are dependent
upon luxuries, and above all for those who make a camp-
ing trip an excuse for debauchery. Neither the man who
wants to take a French cook and champagne on a hunting
trip, nor his equally objectionable though less wealthy
brother who is chiefly concerned with filling and empty-
ing a large whiskey jug, has any place whatever in the
real life of the wilderness.
The chase of an animal should rank according as it
2o8 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
calls for the exercise in a high degree of a large num-
ber of these qualities. The grizzly is almost our only
dangerous game, and under certain conditions shooting
the grizzly calls for considerable courage on the part of
the hunter. Disregarding these comparatively rare occa-
sions, the chase of mountain game, especially the big-
horn, demands more hardihood, power of endurance, and
moral and physical soundness than any other kind of
sport, and so must come first. The wapiti and mule-
deer rank next, for they too must be killed by stalking
as a result of long tramps over very rough ground. To
kill a moose by still hunting is a feat requiring a high
degree of skill, and entailing severe fatigue. When game
is followed on horseback, it means that the successful
hunter must ride well and boldly.
The whitetail is occasionally found where it yields
a very high quality of sport. But normally it lives in
regions where it is extremely difficult to kill it legiti-
mately, as the wapiti and mule-deer are killed, and yet
comparatively easy to kill it under circumstances which
make no demand for any particular prowess on the part
of the hunter. It is far more difficult to still hunt suc-
cessfully in the dense brushy timber frequented by the
whitetail than in the open glades, the mountains, and
the rocky hills, through which the wapiti and mule-deer
wander. The difficulty arises, however, because the chief
requirement is stealth, noiselessness. The man who goes
out into the hills for a mule-deer must walk hard and
far, must be able to bear fatigue, and possibly thirst and
hunger, must have keen eyes, and be a good shot. He
THE WHITETAIL DEER 209
does not need to display the extraordinary power of
stealthy advance which is necessary to the man who would
creep up to and kill a whitetail in thick timber. Now,
the qualities of hardihood and endurance are better than
the quality of stealth, and though all three are necessary
in both kinds of chase, yet it is the chase of the mule-
deer which most develops the former, and the chase of
the whitetail which most develops the latter. When the
woods are bare and there is some snow on the ground,
however, still hunting the whitetail becomes not only
possible, but a singularly manly and attractive kind of
sport. Where the whitetail can be followed with horse
and hound, the sport is also of a very high order. To
be able to ride through woods and over rough country
at full speed, rifle or shotgun in hand, and then to leap
off and shoot at a running object, is to show that one has
the qualities which made the cavalry of Forrest so for-
midable in the Civil War. There could be no better
training for the mounted rifleman, the most efficient type
of modern soldier.
By far the easiest way to kill the whitetail is in one
or other of certain methods which entail very little work
or skill on the part of the hunter. The most noxious
of these, crusting in the deep snows, has already been
spoken of. No sportsman worthy of the name would
ever follow so butcherly a method. Fire hunting must
also normally be ruled out. It is always mere murder
if carried on by a man who sits up at a lick, and is not
much better where the hunter walks through the fields —
not to mention the fact that on such a walk he is quite
2IO AN AMERICAN HUNTER
as apt to kill stock as to kill a deer. But fire hunting
from a boat, or jacking, as it is called, though it entails
absolutely no skill in the hunter, and though it is, and
ought to be, forbidden, as it can best be carried on at
the season when nursing does are particularly apt to be
the victims, nevertheless has a certain charm of its own.
The first deer I ever killed, when a boy, was obtained
in this way, and I have always been glad to have had
the experience, though I have never been willing to
repeat it. I was at the time camped out in the Adiron-
dacks.
Two or three of us, all boys of fifteen or sixteen, had
been enjoying what was practically our first experience
in camping out, having gone out with two guides. Hank
Martin and Mose Sawyer, from Paul Smith's on Lake
St. Regis. My brother and cousin were fond of fishing
and I was not, so I was deputed to try to bring in a
deer. I had a double-barrelled 12-bore gun, French pin-
fire, with which I had industriously collected " speci-
mens " on a trip to Egypt and Palestine and on Long
Island; except for three or four enthralling but not over-
successful days after woodcock and quail, I had done
no game shooting. As to every healthy boy with a taste
for out-door life, the Northern forests were to me a veri-
table land of enchantment. We were encamped by a
stream among the tall pines, and I had enjoyed every-
thing; poling and paddling the boat, tramping through
the woods, the cries of chickaree and chipmunk, of jay,
woodpecker, chickadee, nuthatch, and cross-bill, which
broke the forest stillness ; and, above all, the great reaches
THE WHITETAIL DEER 211
of sombre woodland themselves. The heart-shaped foot-
prints which showed where the deer had come down to
drink and feed on the marshy edges of the water made
my veins thrill; and the nights around the flickering
camp-fire seemed filled with romance.
My first experiment in jacking was a failure. The
jack, a bark lantern, was placed upon a stick in the bow
of the boat, and I sat in a cramped huddle behind it, while
Mose Sawyer plied the paddle with noiseless strength
and skill in the stern. I proved unable to respond even
to the very small demand made upon me, for when we
actually did come upon a deer I failed to see it until
it ran, when I missed it; and on the way back capped my
misfortune by shooting a large owl which perched on a
log projecting into the water, looking at the lantern with
two glaring eyes.
All next day I was miserably conscious of the smoth-
ered disfavor of my associates, and when night fell was
told I would have another chance to redeem myself.
This time we started across a carry, the guide carrying
the light boat, and launched it in a quiet little pond
about a mile off. Dusk was just turning into darkness
when we reached the edge of the little lake, which was
perhaps a mile long by three-quarters of a mile across,
with indented shores. We did not push off for half an
hour or so, until it was entirely dark; and then for a
couple of hours we saw no deer. Nevertheless, I thor-
oughly enjoyed the ghostly, mysterious, absolutely silent
night ride over the water. Not the faintest splash be-
trayed the work of the paddler. The boat glided stealth-
212 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
ily alongshore, the glare of the lantern bringing out for
one moment every detail of the forest growth on the
banks, which the next second vanished into absolute
blackness. Several times we saw muskrats swimming
across the lane of light cut by the lantern through the
darkness, and two or three times their sudden plunging
and splashing caused my heart to leap. Once when we
crossed the lake we came upon a loon floating buoyantly
right out in the middle of it. It stayed until we were
within ten yards, so that I could see the minute outlines
of the feathers and every movement of the eye. Then
it swam off, but made no cry. At last, while crossing
the mouth of a bay we heard a splashing sound among
the lilies inshore, which even my untrained ears recog-
nized as different from any of the other noises we had
yet heard, and a jarring motion of the paddle showed
that the paddler wished me to be on the alert. With-
out any warning, the course of the boat was suddenly
changed, and I was aware that we were moving stern
foremost. Then we swung around, and I could soon
make out that we were going down the little bay. The
forest-covered banks narrowed; then the marsh at the
end was lighted up, and on its hither edge, knee-deep
among the water-lilies, appeared the figure of a yearling
buck still in the red. It stood motionless, gazing at the
light with a curiosity wholly unmixed with alarm, and
at the shot wheeled and fell at the water's edge. We
made up our mind to return to camp that night, as it was
before midnight. I carried the buck and the torch, and
the guide the boat, and the mile walk over the dim trail,
THE WHITETAIL DEER 213
occasionally pitching forward across a stump or root, was
a thing to be remembered. It was my first deer, and
I was very glad to get it; but although only a boy, I had
sense enough to realize that it was not an experience
worth repeating. The paddler in such a case deserves
considerable credit, but the shooter not a particle, even
aside from the fact to which I have already alluded,
that in too many cases such shooting results in the killing
of nursing does. No matter how young a sportsman is,
if he has a healthy mind, he will not long take pleasure
in any method of hunting in which somebody else shows
the skill and does the work so that his share is only nomi-
nal. The minute that sport is carried on on these terms
it becomes a sham, and a sham is always detrimental to
all who take part in it.
Whitetail are comparatively easily killed with
hounds, and there are very many places where this is
almost the only way they can be killed at all. Formerly
in the Adirondacks this method of hunting was carried
on under circumstances which rendered those who took
part in it objects of deserved contempt. The sportsman
stood in a boat while his guides put out one or two hounds
in the chosen forest side. After a longer or shorter run
the deer took to the water; for whitetail are excellent
swimmers, and when pursued by hounds try to shake
them off by wading up or down stream or by swimming
across a pond, and, if tired, come to bay in some pool
or rapid. Once the unfortunate deer was in the water,
the guide rowed the boat after it. If it was yet early in
the season, and the deer was still in the red summer
214 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
coat, it would sink when shot, and therefore the guide
would usually take hold of its tail before the would-be
Nimrod butchered it. If the deer was in the blue, the
carcass would float, so it was not necessary to do anything
quite so palpably absurd. But such sport, so far as the
man who did the shooting was concerned, had not one
redeeming feature. The use of hounds has now been
prohibited by law.
In regions where there are no lakes, and where the
woods are thick, the shooters are stationed at runways
by which it is supposed the deer may pass when the
hounds are after them. Under such circumstances the
man has to show the skill requisite to hit the running
quarry, and if he uses the rifle, this means that he must
possess a certain amount of address in handling the weap-
on. But no other quality is called for, and so even this
method, though often the only possible one (and it may
be necessary to return to it in the Adirondacks) , can never
rank high in the eyes of men who properly appreciate
what big game hunting should be. It is the usual method
of killing deer on Long Island, during the three or four
days of each year when they can be legally hunted. The
deer are found along the south and centre of the eastern
half of the island; they were nearly exterminated a dozen
years ago, but under good laws they have recently in-
creased greatly. The extensive grounds of the various
sportsmen's clubs, and the forests of scrub-oak in the
sparsely settled inland region, give them good harbors
and sanctuaries. On the days when it is legal to shoot
them, hundreds of hunters turn out from the neighbor-
THE WHITETAIL DEER 215
hood, and indeed from all the island and from New York.
On such a day it is almost impossible to get any work
done; for the sport is most democratic, and is shared by
everybody. The hunters choose their position before
dawn, lying in lines wherever deer are likely to pass,
while the hounds are turned into every patch of thick
cover. A most lively day follows, the fusillade being
terrific ; some men are invariably shot, and a goodly num-
ber of deer are killed, mostly by wily old hunters who
kill ducks and quail for a living in the fall.
When the horse is used together with the hounds the
conditions are changed. To ride a horse over rough
country after game always implies hardihood and good
horsemanship, and therefore makes the sport a worthy
one. In very open country — in such country, for instance,
as the whitetail formerly frequented both in Texas and
the Indian Territory — the horseman could ride at the
tail of the pack until the deer was fairly run down. But
nowadays I know of no place where this is possible, for
the whitetail's haunts are such as to make it impracti-
cable for any rider to keep directly behind the hounds.
What he must do is to try to cut the game off by riding
from point to point. He then leaps off the horse and
watches his chance for a shot. This is the way in which
Mr. Mcllhenny has done most of his deer-hunting, in
the neighborhood of his Louisiana plantation.
Around my ranch I very rarely tried to still-hunt
whitetail, because it was always easier to get mule-deer
or prongbuck, if I had time to go off for an all-day's
hunt. Occasionally, however, we would have at the
2i6 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
ranch hounds, usually of the old black-and-tan Southern
type, and then if we needed meat, and there was not time
for a hunt back in the hills, we would turn out and hunt
one or two of the river bottoms with these hounds. If
I rode off to the prairies or the hills I went alone, but
if the quarry was a whitetail, our chance of success de-
pended upon our having a sufficient number of guns to
watch the different passes and runways. Accordingly,
my own share of the chase was usually limited to the
fun of listening to the hounds, and of galloping at head-
long speed from one point where I thought the deer
would not pass to some other, which, as a matter of fact,
it did not pass either. The redeeming feature of the
situation was that if I did get a shot, I almost always got
my deer. Under ordinary circumstances to merely
wound a deer is worse than not hitting it; but when there
are hounds along they are certain to bring the wounded
animal to bay, and so on these hunts we usually got
venison.
Of course, I occasionally got a whitetail when I
was alone, whether with the hounds or without them.
There were whitetail on the very bottom on which the
ranch house stood, as well as on the bottom opposite,
and on those to the right and left up and down stream.
Occasionally I have taken the hounds out alone, and
then as they chevied the whitetail around the bottom,
have endeavored by rapid running on foot or on horse-
back to get to some place from which I could obtain
a shot. The deer knew perfectly well that the hounds
could not overtake them, and they would usually do a
THE WHITETAIL DEER
217
great deal of sneaking round and round through the un-
derbrush and cottonwoods before they finally made up
their minds to leave the bottom. On one occasion a buck
came sneaking down a game trail through the buck brush
where I stood, going so low that I could just see the
tips of his antlers, and though I made desperate efforts
I was not able to get into a position from which I could
obtain a shot. On another occasion, while I was looking
intently into a wood through which I was certain a deer
would pass, it deliberately took to the open ground be-
hind me, and I did not see it until it was just vanishing.
Normally, the end of my efforts was that the deer went
off and the hounds disappeared after it, not to return
for six or eight hours. Once or twice things favored
me; I happened to take the right turn or go in the right
direction, and the deer happened to blunder past me; and
then I returned with venison for supper. Two or three
times I shot deer about nightfall or at dawn, in the im-
mediate neighborhood of the ranch, obtaining them by
sneaking as noiselessly as possible along the cattle trails
through the brush and timber, or by slipping along the
edge of the river bank. Several times I saw deer while
I was sitting on the piazza or on the doorstep of the
ranch, and on one occasion I stepped back into the house,
got the rifle, and dropped the animal from where I stood.
On yet other occasions I obtained whitetail which
lived not on the river bottoms but among the big patches
of brush and timber in the larger creeks. When they
were found in such country I hunted them very much
as I hunted the mule-deer, and usually shot one when
21 8 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
I was expecting as much to see a mule-deer as a white-
tail. When the game was plentiful I would often stay
on my horse until the moment of obtaining the shot, espe-
cially if it was in the early morning or late evening. My
method then was to ride slowly and quietly down the
winding valleys and across the spurs, hugging the bank,
so that, if deer were feeding in the open, I would get
close up before either of us saw the other. Sometimes
the deer would halt for a moment when it saw me, and
sometimes it would bound instantly away. In either case
my chance lay in the speed with which I could jump
off the horse and take my shot. Even in favorable locali-
ties this method was of less avail with whitetail than
mule-deer, because the former were so much more apt
to skulk.
As soon as game became less plentiful my hunting had
to be done on foot. My object was to be on the hunting-
ground by dawn, or else to stay out there until it grew
too dark to see the sights of my rifle. Often all I did
was to keep moving as quietly as possible through likely
ground, ever on the alert for the least trace of game;
sometimes I would select a lookout and carefully scan
a likely country to see if I could not detect something
moving. On one occasion I obtained an old whitetail
buck by the simple exercise of patience. I had twice
found him in a broad basin, composed of several coulees,
all running down to form the head of a big creek, and
all of them well timbered. He dodged me on both occa-
sions, and I made up my mind that I would spend a
whole day in watching for him from a little natural
THE WHITETAIL DEER 219
ambush of sage-bush and cedar on a high point which
overlooked the entire basin. I crept up to my ambush
with the utmost caution early in the morning, and there
I spent the entire day, with my lunch and a water-bottle,
continually scanning the whole region most carefully
with the glasses. The day passed less monotonously than
it sounds, for every now and then I would catch a glimpse
of wild life; once a fox, once a coyote, and once a badger;
while the little chipmunks had a fine time playing all
around me. At last, about mid-afternoon, I suddenly saw
the buck come quietly out of the dense thicket in which
he had made his midday bed, and deliberately walk up
a hillside and lie down in a thin clump of ash where the
sun could get at him — for it was in September, just be-
fore the rut began. There was no chance of stalking
him in the place he had chosen, and all I could do was
to wait. It was nearly sunset before he moved again,
except that I occasionally saw him turn his head. Then
he got up, and after carefully scrutinizing all the neigh-
borhood, moved down into a patch of fairly thick brush,
where I could see him standing and occasionally feeding,
all the time moving slowly up the valley. I now slipped
most cautiously back and trotted nearly a mile until I
could come up behind one of the ridges bounding the
valley in which he was. The wind had dropped and it
was almost absolutely still when I crawled flat on my face
to the crest, my hat in my left hand, my rifle in my
right. There was a big sage-bush conveniently near, and
under this I peered. There was a good deal of brush in
the valley below, and if I had not known that the buck
220 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
was there, I would never have discovered him. As it
was, I watched for a quarter of an hour, and had about
made up my mind that he must have gone somewhere
else, when a slight movement nearly below me attracted
my attention, and I caught a glimpse of him nearly three
hundred yards ofif, moving quietly along by the side of
a little dry watercourse which was right in the middle
of the brush. I waited until he was well past, and then
again slipped back with the utmost care, and ran on until
I was nearly opposite the head of the coulee, when I again
approached the ridge-line. Here there was no sage-bush,
only tufts of tall grass, which were stirring in the little
breeze which had just sprung up, fortunately in the
right direction. Taking advantage of a slight inequality
in the soil, I managed to get behind one of these tufts,
and almost immediately saw the buck. Toward the head
of the coulee the brush had become scanty and low, and
he was now walking straight forward, evidently keeping
a sharp lookout. The sun had just set. His course took
him past me at a distance of eighty yards. When di-
rectly opposite I raised myself on my elbows, drawing
up the rifle, which I had shoved ahead of me. The
movement of course caught his eye at once; he halted
for one second to look around and see what it was, and
during that second I pulled the trigger. Away he went,
his white flag switching desperately, and though he gal-
loped over the hill, I felt he was mine. However, when
I got to the top of the rise over which he had gone,
I could not see him, and as there was a deep though
narrow coulee filled with brush on the other side, I had
THE WHITETAIL DEER 221
a very ugly feeling that I might have lost him, in spite
of the quantity of blood he had left along his trail. It
was getting dark, and I plunged quickly into the coulee.
Usually a wounded deer should not be followed until it
has had time to grow stif¥, but this was just one of the
cases where the rule would have worked badly; in the
first place, because darkness was coming on, and in the
next place, because the animal was certain to die shortly,
and all that I wanted was to see where he was. I fol-
lowed his trail into the coulee, and expected to find that
he had turned down it, but a hurried examination in the
fading light showed me that he had taken the opposite
course, and I scrambled hastily out on the other side,
and trotted along, staring into the brush, and now and
then shouting or throwing in a clod of earth. When
nearly at the head there was a crackling in the brush,
and out burst the wounded buck. He disappeared be-
hind a clump of elms, but he had a hard hill to go up,
and the effort was too much for him. When I next saw
him he had halted, and before I could fire again down
he came.
On another occasion I spied a whole herd of white-
tail feeding in a natural meadow, right out in the open,
in mid-afternoon, and was able to get up so close that
when I finally shot a yearling buck (which was one of
the deer farthest away from me, there being no big buck
in the outfit), the remaining deer, all does and fawns,
scattered in every direction, some galloping right past
me in their panic. Once or twice I was able to perform
a feat of which I had read, but in which I scarcely
222 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
believed. This was, to creep up, to a deer while feed-
ing in the open, by watching when it shook its tail, and
then remaining motionless. I cannot say whether the
habit is a universal one, but on two occasions at least
I was able thus to creep up to the feeding deer, because
before lifting its head it invariably shook its tail, thereby
warning me to stay without moving until it had lifted
its head, scrutinized the landscape, and again lowered
its head to graze. The eyesight of the whitetail, as com-
pared with that of the pronghorn antelope, is poor. It
notes whatever is in motion, but it seems unable to dis-
tinguish clearly anything that is not in motion. On the
occasions in question no antelope that I have ever seen
would have failed to notice me at once and to take alarm.
But the whitetail, although it scrutinized me narrowly,
while I lay motionless with my head toward it, seemed
in each case to think that I must be harmless, and after
a while it would go on feeding. In one instance the
animal fed over a ridge and walked off before I could
get a shot; in the other instance I killed it.
In 1894, on the last day I spent at the ranch, and
with the last bullet I fired from my rifle, I killed a fine
whitetail buck. I left the ranch house early in the after-
noon on my favorite pony, Muley, my foreman, Sylvane
Ferris, riding with me. We forded the shallow river
and rode up a long winding coulee, with belts of tim-
ber running down its bottom. After going a couple of
miles, by sheer good luck we stumbled on three white-
tail — a buck, a doe and a fawn. When we saw them
they were trying to sneak of]f, and immediately my fore-
THE WHITETAIL DEER
223
man galloped toward one end of the belt of timber in
which they were, and started to ride down through it,
while I ran Muley to the other end to intercept them.
They were, of course, quite likely to break off to one
side; but this happened to be one of the occasions when
everything went right. When I reached the spot from
which I covered the exits from the timber, I leaped off,
and immediately afterward heard a shout from my fore-
man that told me the deer were on foot. Muley was
a pet horse, and enjoyed immensely the gallop after
game; but his nerves invariably failed him at the shot.
On this occasion he stood snorting beside me, and finally,
as the deer came in sight, away he tore — only to go about
200 yards, however, and stand and watch us, snorting,
with his ears pricked forward until, when I needed him,
I went for him. At the moment, however, I paid no heed
to Muley, for a cracking in the brush told me the game
was close, and I caught the shadowy outlines of the doe
and the fawn as they scudded through the timber. By
good luck, the buck, evidently flurried, came right on the
edge of the woods next to me, and as he passed, running
like a quarter-horse, I held well ahead of him and pulled
trigger. The bullet broke his neck and down he went —
a fine fellow with a handsome ten-point head, and fat
as a prize sheep; for it was just before the rut. Then
we rode home, and I sat in a rocking-chair on the ranch-
house veranda, looking across the wide, sandy river bed
at the strangely shaped buttes and the groves of shimmer-
ing cottonwoods until the sun went down and the frosty
air bade me go in.
CHAPTER VII
THE MULE-DEER, OR ROCKY MOUNTAIN BLACKTAIL
This is the largest and finest of our three smaller deer.
Throughout its range it is known as the blacktail deer,
and it has as good a historic claim to the title as its Pacific
coast kinsman, the coast or true blacktail. In writing
purely of this species, it seems like pedantry to call it
by its book name of mule-deer, a name which conveys
little or no meaning to the people who live in its haunts
and who hunt it; but it is certainly very confusing to
know two distinct types of deer by one name, and as both
the Rocky Mountain blacktail and Coast blacktail are
thus known, and as the former is occasionally known as
mule-deer, I shall, for convenience' sake, speak of it un-
der this name — a name given it because of its great ears,
which rather detract from its otherwise very handsome
appearance.
The mule-deer is a striking and beautiful animal. As
is the case with our other species, it varies greatly in
size, but is on the average heavier than either the white-
tail or the true blacktail. The horns also average longer
and heavier, and in exceptional heads are really note-
worthy trophies. Ordinarily a full-grown buck has a
head of ten distinct and well-developed points, eight of
which consist of the bifurcations of the two main prongs
into which each antler divides, while in addition there
224
THE MULE-DEER 225
are two shorter basal or frontal points. But the latter
are very irregular, being sometimes missing; while some-
times there are two or three of them on each antler.
When missing it usually means that the antlers are of
young animals that have not attained their full growth.
A yearling will sometimes have merely a pair of spikes,
and sometimes each spike will be bifurcated so as to make
two points. A two-year-old may develop antlers which,
though small, possess the normal four points. Occasion-
ally, where unusually big heads are developed, there are
a number of extra points. If these are due to deformity,
they simply take away from the beauty of the head ; but
where they are symmetrical, while at the same time the
antlers are massive, they add greatly to the beauty. All
the handsomest and largest heads show this symmetri-
cal development of extra points. It is rather hard to
lay down a hard-and-fast rule for counting them. The
largest and finest antlers are usually rough, and it is
not easy to say when a particular point in roughness has
developed so that it may legitimately be called a prong.
The largest head I ever got to my own rifle had twenty-
eight points, symmetrically arranged, the antlers being
rough and very massive as well as very long. The buck
was an immense fellow, but no bigger than other bucks
I have shot which possessed ordinary heads.
The mule-deer is found from the rough country
which begins along the eastern edges of the great plains,
across the Rocky Mountains to the eastern slopes of the
coast ranges, and into southern California. It extends
into Canada on the north and Mexico on the south. On
226 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the west it touches, and here and there crosses, the boun-
daries of the Coast blacktail. The whitetail is found in
places throughout its habitat from east to west and from
north to south. But there are great regions in this ter-
ritory which are peculiarly fitted for the mule-deer, but
in which the whitetail is never found, as the habits of
the two are entirely different. In the mountains of west-
ern Colorado and Wyoming, for instance, the mule-deer
swarms, but the whole region is unfit for the whitetail,
which is accordingly only found in a very few narrowly
restricted localities.
The mule-deer does not hold its own as well as the
whitetail in the presence of man, but it is by no means
as quickly exterminated as the wapiti. The outside
limits of its range have not shrunk materially in the cen-
tury during which it has been known to white hunters.
It was never found until the fertile, moist country of the
Mississippi Valley was passed and the dry plains region
to the west of it reached, and it still exists in some num-
bers here and there in this country, as, for instance, in
the Bad Lands along the Little Missouri, and in the
Black Hills. But although its limits of distribution have
not very sensibly diminished, there are large portions of
the range within these limits from which it has practically
vanished, and in most places its numbers have been woe-
fully thinned. It holds its own best among the more in-
accessible mountain masses of the Rockies, and from
Chihuahua to Alberta there are tracts where it is still
abundant. Yet even in these places the numbers are di-
minishing, and this process can be arrested only by better
THE MULE-DEER 227
laws, and above all, by a better administration of the law.
The national Government could do much by establishing
its forest reserves as game reserves, and putting on a suf-
ficient number of forest rangers who should be empow-
ered to prevent all hunting on the reserves. The State
governments can do still more. Colorado has good laws,
but they are not well enforced. The easy method of
accounting for this fact is to say that it is due to the
politicians; but in reality the politicians merely represent
the wishes, or more commonly the indifference, of the
people. As long as the good citizens of a State are indif-
ferent to game protection, or take but a tepid interest
in it, the politicians, through their agents, will leave the
game laws unenforced. But if the people of Colorado,
Wyoming, and Montana come to feel the genuine interest
in the enforcement of these laws that the people of Maine
and Vermont have grown to take during the past twenty
years, that the people of Montana and Wyoming who
dwell alongside the Yellowstone Park are already taking
— then not only will the mule-deer cease to diminish, but
it will positively increase. It is a mistake to suppose that
such a change would only be to the advantage of well-
to-do sportsmen. Men who are interested in hunting for
hunting's sake, men who come from the great cities re-
mote from the mountains in order to get three or four
weeks' healthy, manly holiday, would undoubtedly be
benefited; but the greatest benefit would be to the peo-
ple of the localities, of the neighborhoods round about.
The presence of the game would attract outsiders who
would leave in the country money, or its equivalent,
228 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
which would many times surpass in value the game they
actually killed; and furthermore, the preservation of the
game would mean that the ranchmen and grangers who
live near its haunts would have in perpetuity the chance
of following the pleasantest and healthiest of all out-of-
door pastimes; whereas, if through their short-sighted-
ness they destroy, or permit to be destroyed, the game,
they are themselves responsible for the fact that their
children and children's children will find themselves for-
ever debarred from a pursuit which must under such
circumstances become the amusement only of the very
rich. If we are really alive to our opportunities under
our democratic social and political system, we can keep
for ourselves — and by " ourselves " I mean the enormous
bulk of men whose means range from moderate to very
small — ample opportunity for the enjoyment of hunting
and shooting, of vigorous and blood-stirring out-of-doors
sport. If we fail to take advantage of our possibilities,
if we fail to pass, in the interest of all, wise game laws,
and to see that these game laws are properly enforced,
we shall then have to thank ourselves if in the future the
game is only found in the game preserves of the wealthy;
and under such circumstances only these same wealthy
people will have the chance to hunt it.
The mule-deer differs widely from the whitetail in
its habits, and especially in its gait, and in the kind of
country which it frequents. Although in many parts of
its range it is found side by side with its whitetail cousin,
the two do not actually associate together, and their pro-
pinquity is due simply to the fact, that the river bottoms
THE MULE-DEER 229
being a favorite haunt of the whitetail, long tongues of
the distribution area of this species are thrust into the
domain of its bolder, less stealthy and less crafty kinsman.
Throughout the plains country the whitetail is the deer of
the river bottoms, where the rank growth gives it secure
hiding-places, as well as ample food. The mule-deer, on
the contrary, never comes down into the dense growths
of the river bottoms. Throughout the plains country
it is the deer of the broken Bad Lands which fringe these
river bottoms on either side, and of the rough ravines
which wind their way through the Bad Lands to the edge
of the prairie country which lies back of them. The
broken hills, their gorges filled with patches of ash, buck
brush, cedar, and dwarf pine, form a country in which
the mule-deer revels. The whitetail will, at times, wan-
der far out on the prairies where the grass is tall and
rank; but it is not nearly so bold or fond of the open
as the mule-deer. The latter is frequently found in hilly
country where the covering is so scanty that the animal
must be perpetually on the watch, as if it were a bighorn
or prongbuck, in order to spy its foes at a distance and
escape before they can come near; whereas the whitetail
usually seeks to elude observation by hiding — by its
crouching, stealthy habits.
It must be remembered, however, that with the mule-
deer, as with all other species of animals, there is a wide
variability in habits under different conditions. This is
often forgotten even by trained naturalists, who accept
the observations made in one locality as if they applied
throughout the range of the species. Thus in the gen-
230 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
erally good account of the habits of this species in Mr.
Lydeker's book on the " Deer of All Lands " it is asserted
that mule-deer never dwell permanently in the forest, and
feed almost exclusively on grass. The first statement is
entirely, the second only partly, true of the mule-deer of
the plains from the Little Missouri westward to the head-
waters of the Platte, the Yellowstone, and the Big Horn;
but there are large parts of the Rockies in which neither
statement applies at all. In the course of several hunt-
ing trips among the densely wooded mountains of western
Montana, along the water-shed separating the streams
that flow into Clarke's Fork of the Columbia from those
that ultimately empty into Kootenay Lake, I found the
mule-deer plentiful in many places where practically the
whole country was covered by dense forest, and where
the opportunities for grazing were small indeed, as we
found to our cost in connection with our pack-train. In
this region the mule-deer lived the entire time among
the timber, and subsisted for the most part on browse.
Occasionally they would find an open glade and graze;
but the stomachs of those killed contained not grass, but
blueberries and the leaves and delicate tips of bushes. I
was not in this country in winter, but it was evident that
even at that season the deer must spend their time in the
thick timber. There was no chance for them to go above
the timber line, because the mountains were densely
wooded to their summits, and the white goats of the local-
ity also lived permanently in the timber.' It was far
* I call particular attention to this fact concerning the white goat, as certain
recent writers, including Mr. Madison Grant, have erroneously denied it.
THE MULE-DEER 231
harder to get the mule-deer than it was to get the white
goats, for the latter were infinitely more conspicuous,
were slower in their movements, and bolder and less shy.
Almost the only way we succeeded in killing the deer
was by finding one of their well-trodden paths and lying
in wait beside it very early in the morning or quite late
in the afternoon. The season was August and September,
and the deer were astir long before sunset. They usually,
but not always, lay high up on the mountain-sides, and
while they sometimes wandered to and fro browsing on
the mountains, they often came down to feed in the val-
leys, where the berries were thicker. Their paths were
well beaten, although, like all game trails, after being
as plainly marked as a pony track for a quarter of a
mile or so, they would suddenly grow faint and vanish.
The paths ran nearly straight up and down hill, and even
when entirely undisturbed, the deer often came down
them at a great rate, bouncing along in a way that showed
that they had no fear of developing the sprung knees
which we should fear for a domestic animal which habit-
ually tried the same experiment.
In other habits also the deer vary widely in different
localities. For instance, there is an absolute contrast as
regards their migratory habits between the mule-deer
which live in the Bad Lands along the Little Missouri,
and those which live in northwestern Colorado ; and this
difference is characteristic generally of the deer which
in the summer dwell in the high mountains, as contrasted
with those which bear and rear their young in the low,
broken hill-country. Along the Little Missouri there
232
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
was no regular or clearly defined migration of the mule-
deer in a mass. Some individuals, or groups of individ-
uals, shifted their quarters for a few miles, so that in the
spring, for instance, a particular district of a few square
miles, in which they had been abundant before, might
be wholly without them. But there were other districts,
which happened to afford at all times sufficient food and
shelter, in which they were to be found the year round;
and the animals did not band and migrate as the prong-
bucks did in the same region. In the immediate neigh-
borhood of my ranch there were groups of high hills
containing springs of water, good grass, and an abun-
dance of cedar, ash, and all kinds of brush in which the
mule-deer were permanent residents. There were big
dry creeks, with well-wooded bottoms, lying among rug-
ged hills, in which I have found whitetail and mule-deer
literally within a stone's throw of one another. I once
started from two adjoining pockets in this particular
creek two does, each with a fawn, one being a mule-deer
and the other a whitetail. On another occasion, on an
early spring afternoon, just before the fawns were born,
I came upon a herd of twenty whitetails, does, and young
of the preceding year, grazing greedily on the young
grass; and half a mile up the creek, in an almost exactly
similar locality, I came upon just such a herd of mule-
deer. In each case the animals were so absorbed in the
feasting, which was to make up for their winter priva-
tions, that I was able to stalk to within fifty yards, though
of course I did not shoot.
In northwestern Colorado the conditions are entirely
THE MULE-DEER 233
different. Throughout this region there are no whitetail
and never have been, although in the winter range of
the mule-deer there are a few prongbuck; and the wapiti
once abounded. The mule-deer are still plentiful. They
make a complete migration summer and winter, so that
in neither season is a single individual to be found in
the haunts they frequent during the other season. In
the summer they live and bring forth their young high up
in the main chain of the mountains, in a beautiful country
of northern forest growth, dotted with trout-filled brooks
and clear lakes. The snowfall is so deep in these wooded
mountains that the deer would run great risk of perish-
ing if they stayed therein, and indeed could only winter
there at all in very small numbers. Accordingly, when
the storms begin in the fall, usually about the first of
October, just before the ruf, the deer assemble in bands
and move west and south to the lower, drier country,
where the rugged hills are here and there clothed with
an open growth of pinyon and cedar, instead of the tall
spruces and pines of the summer range. The migrating
bands follow one another along definite trails over moun-
tains, through passes and valleys, and across streams; and
their winter range swarms with them a few days after
the forerunners have put in their appearance in what has
been, during the summer, an absolutely deerless country.
In January and February, 1901, I spent five weeks
north of the White River, in northwestern Colorado. It
was in the heart of the wintering ground of the great
Colorado mule-deer herd. Forty miles away to the east,
extending north, lay the high mountains in which these
234
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
deer had spent the summer. The winter range, in which
I was at the time hunting cougars, is a region of com-
paratively light snowfall, though the cold is bitter. On
several occasions during my stay the thermometer went
down to twenty degrees below zero. The hills, or low
mountains, for it was difficult to know which to call
them, were steep and broken, and separated by narrow
flats covered with sage-brush. The ordinary trees were
the pinyon and cedar, which were scattered in rather
open groves over the mountain-sides and the spurs be-
tween the ravines. There were also patches of quaking
asp, scrub oak, and brush. The entire country was thinly
covered with ranches, and there were huge pastures en-
closed by wire fences. I have never seen the mule-deer
so numerous anywhere as they were in this country at
this time; although in 1883, on the Little Missouri, they
were almost as plentiful. There was not a day we did
not see scores, and on some days we saw hundreds. Fre-
quently they were found in small parties of two or three,
or a dozen individuals, but on occasions we saw bands
of thirty or forty. Only rarely were they found singly.
The fawns were of course well grown, being eight or
nine months old, and long out of the spotted coat. They
were still accompanying their mothers. Ordinarily a
herd would consist of does, fawns, and yearlings, the
latter carrying their first antlers. But it was not pos-
sible to lay down a universal rule. Again and again
I saw herds in which there were one or two full-grown
bucks associating with the females and younger deer.
At other times we came across small bands of full-
THE MULE-DEER 235
grown bucks by themselves, and occasionally a solitary
buck. Considering the extent to which these deer must
have been persecuted, I did not think them shy. We
were hunting on horseback, and had hounds with us, so
we made no especial attempt to avoid noise. Yet very
frequently we would come close on the deer before they
took alarm; and even when alarmed they would some-
times trot slowly off, halting and looking back. On one
occasion, in some bad lands, we came upon four bucks
which had been sunning themselves on the face of a clay
wall. They jumped up and went off one at a time, very
slowly, passing diagonally by us, certainly not over
seventy yards off. All four could have been shot with-
out effort, and as they had fine antlers I should certainly
have killed one, had it been the open season.
When we came on these Colorado mule-deer sud-
denly, they generally behaved exactly as their brethren
used to in the old days on the Little Missouri; that is,
they would run off at a good speed for a hundred yards
or so, then slow up, halt, gaze inquisitively at us for
some seconds, and again take to flight. While the sun
was strong they liked to lie out in the low brush on
slopes where they would get the full benefit of the heat.
During the heavy snowstorms they usually retreated into
some ravine where the trees grew thicker than usual, not
stirring until the weight of the storm was over. Most
of the night, especially if it was moonlight, they fed;
but they were not at all regular about this. I frequently
saw them standing up and grazing, or more rarely brows-
ing, in the middle of the day, and in the late afternoon
236 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
they often came down to graze on the flats within view
of the different ranch-houses where I happened to stop.
The hours for feeding and resting, however, always vary
accordingly as the deer are or are not persecuted. In
wild localities I have again and again found these deer
grazing at all hours of the day, and coming to water
at high noon ; whereas, where they have been much per-
secuted, they only begin to feed after dusk, and come to
water after dark. Of course during this winter weather
they could get no water, snow supplying its place.
I was immensely interested with the way they got
through the wire fences. A mule-deer is a great jumper;
I have known them to clear with ease high timber corral
fences surrounding hayricks. If the animals had chosen,
they could have jumped any of the wire fences I saw;
yet never in a single instance did I see one of them so
jump a fence, nor did I ever find in the tell-tale snow
tracks which indicated their having done so. They paid
no heed whatever to the fences, so far as I could see, and
went through them at will; but they always got between
the wires, or went under the lowest wire. The dexterity
with which they did this was extraordinary. When
alarmed they would run full speed toward a wire fence,
would pass through it, often hardly altering their stride,
and never making any marks in the snow which looked
as though they had crawled. Twice I saw bands thus
go through a wire fence, once at speed, the other time
when they were not alarmed. On both occasions they
were too far oflF to allow me to see exactly their mode
of procedure, but on examining the snow where they had
THE MULE-DEER
237
passed, there was not the slightest mark of their bodies,
and the alteration in their gait, as shown by the footprints,
was hardly perceptible. In one instance, however, where
I scared a young buck which ran over a hill and through
a wire fence on the other side, I found one of his antlers
lying beside the fence, it having evidently been knocked
off by the wire. Their antlers were getting very loose,
and toward the end of our stay they had begun to shed
them.
The deer were preyed on by many foes. Sportsmen
and hide-hunters had been busy during the fall migra-
tions, and the ranchmen of the neighborhood were shoot-
ing them occasionally for food, even when we were
out there. The cougars at this season were preying upon
them practically to the exclusion of everything else. We
came upon one large fawn which had been killed by a
bobcat. The gray wolves were also preying upon them.
A party of these wolves can sometimes run down even
an unwounded blacktail; I have myself known of their
performing this feat. Twice on this very hunt we came
across the carcasses of blacktail which had thus been
killed by wolves, and one of the cow-punchers at a ranch
where we were staying came in and reported to us that
while riding among the cattle that afternoon he had seen
two coyotes run a young mule-deer to a standstill, and
they would without doubt have killed it had they not
been frightened by his approach. Still the wolf is very
much less successful than the cougar in killing these deer,
and even the cougar continually fails in his stalks. But
the deer were so plentiful that at this time all the cougars
238 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
we killed were very fat, and evidently had no difficulty
in getting as much venison as they needed. The wolves
were not as well ofif, and now and then made forays on
the young stock of the ranchmen, which at this season
the cougar let alone, reserving his attention to them for
the summer season when the deer had vanished.
In the Big Horn Mountains, where I also saw a good
deal of the mule-deer, their habits were intermediate
between those of the species that dwell on the plains and
those that dwell in the densely timbered regions of the
Rockies farther to the northwest. In the summer time
they lived high up on the plateaus of the Big Horn, some-
times feeding in the open glades and sometimes in the
pine forests. In the fall they browsed on certain of the
bushes almost exclusively. In winter they came down
into the low country. South of the Yellowstone Park,
where the wapiti swarmed, the mule-deer were not nu-
merous. I believe that by choice they prefer rugged, open
country, and they certainly care comparatively little for
bad weather, as they will often visit bleak, wind-swept
ridges in midwinter, as being places where they can best
get food at that season, when the snow lies deep in the
sheltered places. Nevertheless, many of the species pass
their whole life in thick timber.
My chief opportunities for observing the mule-deer
were in the eighties, when I spent much of my time on
my ranch on the Little Missouri. Mule-deer were then
very plentiful, and I killed more of them than of all
other game put together. At that time in the cattle coun-
try no ranchman ever thought of killing beef, and if
THE MULE-DEER 239
we had fresh meat at all it was ordinarily venison. In
the fall we usually tried to kill enough deer to last out the
winter. Until the settlers came in, the Little Missouri
country was an ideal range for mule-deer, and they fairly
swarmed; while elk were also plentiful, and the restless
herds of the buffalo surged at intervals through the land.
After 1882 and 1883 the buffalo and elk were killed out,
the former completely, and the latter practically, and
by that time the skin-hunters, and then the ranchers,
turned their attention chiefly to the mule-deer. It lived
in open country where there was cover for the stalker,
and so it was much easier to kill than either the whitetail,
which was found in the dense cover of the river bottoms,
or the prongbuck, which was found far back from the
river, on the flat prairies where there was no cover at
all. I have been informed of other localities in which
the antelope has disappeared long before the mule-deer,
and I believe that in the Rockies the mule-deer has a
far better chance of survival than the antelope has on
the plains; but on the Little Missouri the antelope con-
tinued plentiful long after the mule-deer had become
decidedly scarce. In 1886 I think the antelope were
fully as abundant as ever they were, while the mule-deer
had wofully diminished. In the early nineties there were
still regions within thirty or forty miles of my ranch
where the antelope were very plentiful — far more so than
the mule-deer were at that time. Now they are both
scarce along the Little Missouri, and which will outlast
the other I cannot say.
In the old days, as I have already said, it was by no
240 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
means infrequent to see both the whitetail and the mule-
deer close together, and when, under such circumstances,
they were alarmed, one got a clear idea of the extraor-
dinary gait which is the mule-deer's most striking char-
acteristic. It trots well, gallops if hard pressed, and is
a good climber, though much inferior to the mountain
sheep. But its normal gait consists of a series of stif¥-
legged bounds, all four feet leaving and striking the
ground at the same time. This gait differs more from
the gait of bighorn, prongbuck, whitetail, and wapiti
than the gaits of these latter animals differ among them-
selves. The wapiti, for instance, rarely gallops, but when
he does, it is a gallop of the ordinary type. The prong-
buck runs with a singularly even gait; whereas the white-
tail makes great bounds, some much higher than others.
But fundamentally in all cases the action is the same,
and has no resemblance to the stiff-legged buck jumping
which is the ordinary means of progression of the mule-
deer. These jumps carry it not only on the level, but
up and down hill at a great speed. It is said to be a tire-
some gait for the animal, if hunted for any length of
time on the level; but of this I cannot speak with full
knowledge.
Compared to the wapiti, the mule-deer, like our other
small deer, is a very silent animal. For a long time I
believed it uttered no sound beyond the snort of alarm
and the rare bleat of the doe to her fawn; but one after-
noon I heard two bucks grunting or barking at one an-
other in a ravine back of the ranch-house, and crept up
and shot them. I was still uncertain whether this was
THE MULE-DEER 241
an indication of a regular habit; but a couple of years
later, on a moonlight night just after sunset, I heard a
big buck travelling down a ravine and continually bark-
ing, evidently as a love challenge. I have been informed
by some hunters that the bucks at the time of the rut
not infrequently thus grunt and bark; but most hunters
are ignorant of this habit; and it is certainly not a com-
mon practice.
The species is not nearly as gregarious as the wapiti
or caribou. During the winter the bucks are generally
found singly, or in small parties by themselves, although
occasionally one will associate with a party of does and of
young deer. When in May or June — for the exact time
varies with the locality — the doe brings forth her young,
she retires to some lonely thicket. Sometimes one and
sometimes two fawns are brought forth. They lie very
close for the first few days. I have picked them up and
handled them without their making the slightest effort to
escape, while the mother hung about a few hundred
yards off. On one occasion I by accident surprised a
doe in the very act of giving birth to two fawns. One
had just been born and the other was born as the doe
made her first leap away. She ran off with as much
speed and unconcern as if nothing whatever had hap-
pened. I passed on immediately, lest she should be so
frightened as not to come back to the fawns. It has hap-
pened that where I have found the newly borri fawns I
have invariably found the doe to be entirely alone, but
her young of the previous year must sometimes at least
be in the neighborhood, for a little later I have frequently
242 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
seen the doe and her fawn or fawns, and either one or two
young of the previous year, together. Often, however,
these young deer will be alone, or associated with an older
doe which is barren. The bucks at the same time go to
secluded places; sometimes singly, while sometimes an
old buck will be accompanied by a younger one, or a
couple of old bucks will lie together. They move about
as little as possible while their horns are growing, and
if a hunter comes by, they will lie far closer than at any
other time of the year, squatting in the dense thickets
as if they were whitetails.
When in the Bad Lands of the Western Dakotas the
late September breezes grow cold, then the bucks, their
horns already clean of velvet which they have thrashed off
on the bushes and saplings, feel their necks begin to swell ;
and early in October — sometimes not until November —
they seek the does. The latter, especially the younger
ones, at first flee in frantic haste. As the rut goes on the
bucks become ever bolder and more ardent. Not only
do they chase the does by night, but also by day. I have
sat on the side of a ravine in the Bad Lands at noon
and seen a young doe race past me as if followed by a
wolf. When she was out of sight a big buck appeared
on her trail, following it by scent, also at speed. When
he had passed I got up, and the motion frightened a
younger buck which was following two or three hundred
yards in the rear of the big one. After a while the doe
yields, and the buck then accompanies her. If, however,
it is early in the season, he may leave her entirely in
order to run after another doe. Later in the season he
THE MULE-DEER 243
will have a better chance of adding the second doe to his
harem, or of robbing another buck of the doe or does
which he has accumulated. I have often seen merely
one doe and one buck together, and I have often seen a
single doe which for several days was accompanied by
several bucks, one keeping off the others. But generally
the biggest bucks collect each for himself several does,
yearlings also being allowed in the band. The exact
amount of companionship with the does allowed these
young bucks depends somewhat upon the temper of the
master buck. In books by imperfectly informed writers
we often see allusions to the buck as protecting the
doe, or even taking care of the fawn. Charles Dudley
Warner, for instance, in describing with great skill and
pathos an imaginary deer hunt, after portraying the death
of the doe, portrays the young fawn as following the buck
when the latter comes back to it in the evening.* As a
matter of fact, while the fawn is so young as to be wholly
dependent upon the doe, the buck never comes near
either. Moreover, during the period when the buck and
the doe are together, the buck's attitude is merely that of
a brutal, greedy, and selfish tyrant. He will unhesitat-
ingly rob the doe of any choice bit of food, and though
he will fight to keep her if another buck approaches, the
moment that a dangerous foe appears his one thought is
for his own preservation. He will not only desert the
doe, but if he is an old and cunning buck, he will try his
* While the situation thus described was an impossible one, the purpose of
Mr. Warner's article was excellent, it being intended as a protest against hunt-
ing deer while the fawns are young, and against killmg them in the water.
244 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
best to sacrifice her by diverting the attention of the pur-
suer to her and away from him.
By the end of the rut the old bucks are often ex-
hausted, their sides are thin, their necks swollen; though
they are never as gaunt as wapiti bulls at this time. They
then rest as much as possible, feeding all the time to put
on fat before winter arrives, and rapidly attaining a very
high condition.
Except in dire need no one would kill a deer after
the hard weather of winter begins or before the antlers
of the buck are full-grown and the fawns are out of the
spotted coat. Even in the old days we, who lived in the
ranch country, always tried to avoid killing deer in the
spring or early summer, though we often shot buck ante-
lope at those times. The close season for deer varies in
different States, and now there is generally a limit set to
the number any one hunter can kill ; for the old days of
wasteful plenty are gone forever.
To my mind there is a peculiar fascination in hunt-
ing the mule-deer. By the time the hunting season has
arrived the buck is no longer the slinking beast of the
thicket, but a bold and yet wary dweller in the up-
lands. Frequently he can be found clear of all cover,
often at midday, and his habits at this season are, from
the hunter's standpoint, rather more like those of the
wapiti than of the whitetail; but each band, though con-
tinually shifting its exact position, stays permanently
in the same tract of country, whereas wapiti are apt to
wander.
In the old days, when mule-deer were plentiful in
THE MULE-DEER 245
country through which a horse could go at a fair rate
of speed, it was common for the hunter to go on horse-
back, and not to dismount save at the moment of the
shot. In the early eighties, while on my ranch on the
Little Missouri, this was the way in which I usually
hunted. When I first established my ranch I often went
out, in the fall, after the day's work was over, and killed
a deer before dark. If it was in September, I would
sometimes start after supper. Later in the year I would
take supper when I got back. Under such circumstances
my mode of procedure was simple. Deer were plentiful.
Every big tangle of hills, every set of grassy coulees wind-
ing down to a big creek bottom, was sure to contain them.
The time being short, with at most only an hour or two
of light, I made no effort to find the tracks of a deer
or to spy one afar ofif. I simply rode through the likely
places, across the heads of the ravines or down the wind-
ing valleys, until I jumped a deer close enough up to give
me a shot. The unshod hoofs of the horse made but lit-
tle noise as he shuffled along at the regular cow-pony
fox trot, and I kept him close into the bank or behind
cover, so as to come around each successive point with-
out warning. If the ground was broken and rugged, I
made no attempt to go fast. If, on the other hand, I
struck a smooth ravine with gentle curves, I would often
put the pony to a sharp canter or gallop, so as to come
quickly on any deer before it could quite make up its
mind what course was best to follow. Sooner or later,
as I passed a thick clump of young ash or buck brush,
or came abruptly around a sharp bend, there would be
246 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
a snort, and then the thud, thud, thud, of four hoofs strik-
ing the ground exactly in unison, and away would go a
mule-deer with the peculiar bounding motion of its kind.
The pony, well accustomed to the work, stopped short,
and I was off its back in an instant. If the deer had
not made out exactly what I was, it would often show
by its gait that it was not yet prepared to run straight
out of sight. Under such circumstances I would wait
until it stopped and turned round to look back. If it
was going very fast, I took the shot running. Once I
put up a young buck from some thick brush in the bot-
tom of a winding washout. I leaped ofif the pony, stand-
ing within ten yards of the washout. The buck went up
a hill on my left, and as he reached the top and paused
for a second on the sky-line, I fired. At the shot there
was a great scrambling and crashing in the washout be-
low me, and another and larger buck came out and tore
off in frantic haste. I fired several shots at him, finally
bringing him down. Meanwhile, the other buck had
disappeared, but there was blood on his trail, and I found
him lying down in the next coulee, and finished him.
This was not much over a mile from the ranch-house,
and after dressing the deer, I put one behind the saddle
and one on it, and led the pony home.
Such hunting, though great fun, does not imply any
particular skill either in horsemanship, marksmanship, or
plainscraft and knowledge of the animal's habits; and
it can of course be followed only where the game is very
plentiful. Ordinarily the mule-deer must be killed by
long tramping among the hills, skilful stalking, and good
THE MULE-DEER 247
shooting. The successful hunter should possess good eyes,
good wind, and good muscles. He should know how to
take cover and how to use his rifle. The work is suf-
ficiently rough to test any man's endurance, antl yet there
is no such severe and intense toil as in following true
mountain game, like the bighorn or white goat. As the
hunter's one aim is to see the deer before it sees him,
he can only use the horse to take him to the hunting-
ground. Then he must go through the most likely
ground and from every point of vantage scan with mi-
nute care the landscape round about, while himself un-
seen. If the country is wild and the deer have not been
much molested, he will be apt to come across a band
that is feeding. Under such circumstances it is easy to
see them at once. But if lying down, it is astonishing
how the gray of their winter coats fits in with the color
of their surroundings. Too often I have looked carefully
over a valley with my glasses until, thinking I had
searched every nook, I have risen and gone forward, only
to see a deer rise and gallop off out of range from some
spot which I certainly thought I had examined with all
possible precaution. If the hunter is not himself hidden,
he will have his labor for his pains. Neither the mule-
deer nor the whitetail is by any means as keen-sighted as
the pronghorn antelope, and men accustomed chiefly to
antelope shooting are quite right in speaking of the sight
of deer as poor by comparison. But this is only by com-
parison. A motionless object does not attract the deer's
gaze as it attracts the telescopic eye of a prongbuck; but
any motion is seen at once, and as soon as this has oc-
248 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
curred, the chances of the hunter are usually at an end.
On the other hand, from the nature of its haunts the mule-
deer usually offers fairly good opportunities for stalking.
It is not as big or as valuable as the elk, and therefore
it is not as readily seen or as eagerly followed, and in
consequence holds its own better. But though the sport
it yields calls normally for a greater amount of hardihood
and endurance in the hunter than is the case with the
sport yielded by the prongbuck, and especially by the
whitetail, yet when existing in like numbers it is easier
to kill than either of these two animals.
Sometimes in the early fall, when hunting from the
ranch, I have spent the night in some likely locality, sleep-
ing rolled up in a blanket on the ground so as to be ready
to start at the first streak of dawn. On one such occa-
sion a couple of mule-deer came to where my horse was
picketed just before I got up. I heard them snort or
whistle, and very slowly unwrapped myself from the
blanket, turned over, and crawled out, rifle in hand.
Overhead the stars were paling in the faint gray light,
but the ravine in which the deer were was still so black
that, watch as I would, I could not see them. I feared to
move around lest I might disturb them, but after wig-
gling toward a little jutting shoulder I lay still to wait
for the light. They went off, however, while it was still
too dusk to catch more than their dim and formless out-
lines, and though I followed them as rapidly and cau-
tiously as possible, I never got a shot at them. On other
occasions fortune has favored me, and before the sun rose
I have spied some buck leisurely seeking his day bed.
THE MULE-DEER 249
and have been able either to waylay him or make a run-
ning stalk on him from behind.
In the old days it was the regular thing with most
ranchmen to take a trip in the fall for the purpose of
laying in the winter's supply of venison. I frequently
took such trips myself, and though occasionally we killed
wapiti, bighorn, prongbuck, and whitetail, our ordinary
game was the mule-deer. Around my ranch it was not
necessary to go very far. A day's journey with the wagon
would usually take us to where a week's hunting would
enable us to return with a dozen deer or over. If there
was need of more, I would repeat the hunt later on. I
have several times killed three of these deer in a day,
but I do not now recall ever killing a greater number.
It is perhaps unnecessary to say that every scrap of flesh
was used.
These hunts were always made late in the fall, usually
after the close of the rut. The deer were then banded,
and were commonly found in parties of from three or
four to a score, although the big bucks might be lying
by themselves. The weather was apt to be cold, and the
deer evidently liked to sun themselves, so that at mid-
day they could be found lying sometimes in thin brush
and sometimes boldly out on the face of a clifif or hill.
If they were unmolested, they would feed at intervals
throughout the day, and not until the bands had been
decimated by excessive hunting did they ever spend the
hours of daylight in hiding.
On such a hunt our proceedings were simple. The
nights were longer than the days, and therefore we were
250 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
away from camp at the first streak of dawn, and might
not return until long after darkness. All the time be-
tween was spent in climbing and walking through the
rugged hills, keeping a sharp lookout for our game.
Only too often we were seen before we ourselves saw
the quarry, and even when this was not the case the
stalks were sometimes failures. Still blank days were not
very common. Probably every hunter remembers with
pride some particular stalk. I recall now outwitting a
big buck which I had seen and failed to get on two suc-
cessive days. He was hanging about a knot of hills with
brush on their shoulders, and was not only very watchful,
but when he lay down always made his bed at the lower
end of a brush patch, whence he could see into the valley
below, while it was impossible to approach him from
above, through the brush, without giving the alarm. On
the third day I saw him early in the morning, while he
was feeding. He was very watchful, and I made no at-
tempt to get near him, simply peeping at him until he
finally went into a patch of thin brush and lay down.
As I knew what he was I could distinctly make him out.
If I had not seen him go in, I certainly never would have
imagined that he was a deer, even had my eyes been able
to pick him out at all among the gray shadows and small
dead tree-tops. Having waited until he was well settled
down, I made a very long turn and came up behind him,
only to find that the direction of the wind and the slope
of the hill rendered it an absolute impossibility to ap-
proach him unperceived. After careful study of the
ground I abandoned the effort, and returned to my former
THE MULE-DEER 251
position, having spent several hours of considerable labor
in vain. It v^as now about noon, and I thought I would
lie still to see what he would do when he got up, and
accordingly I ate my lunch stretched at full length in
the long grass which sheltered me from the wind. From
time to time I peered cautiously between two stones
toward where the buck lay. It was nearly mid-afternoon
before he moved. Sometimes mule-deer rise with a sin-
gle motion, all four legs unbending like springs, so that
the four hoofs touch the ground at once. This old buck,
however, got up very slowly, looked about for certainly
five minutes, and then came directly down the hill and
toward me. When he had nearly reached the bottom of
the valley between us he turned to the right and sauntered
rapidly down it. I slipped back and trotted as fast as
I could without losing my breath along the hither side
of the spur which lay between me and the buck. While
I was out of sight he had for some reason made up his
mind to hurry, and when I was still fifty yards from the
end of the spur he came in sight just beyond it, passing
at a swinging trot. I dropped on one knee so quickly
that for a moment he evidently could not tell what I
was — my buckskin shirt and gray slouch-hat fading into
the color of the background — and halted, looking sharp-
ly around. Before he could break into flight my bullet
went through his shoulders.
Twice I have killed two of these deer at a shot; once
two bucks, and once a doe and a buck.
It has proved difficult to keep the mule-deer in cap-
tivity, even in large private parks or roomy zoological
252 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
gardens. I think this is because hitherto the experiment
has been tried east of the Mississippi in an alien habitat.
The wapiti and whitetail are species that are at home
over most of the United States, East and West, in rank,
wet prairies, dense woodland, and dry mountain regions
alike; but the mule-deer has a far more sharply localized
distribution. In the Bronx Zoological Gardens, in New
York, Mr. Hornaday informs me that he has compara-
tively little difficulty in keeping up the stock alike of
wapiti and whitetail by breeding — as indeed any visitor
can see for himself. The same is true in the game pre-
serves in the wilder regions of New York and New Eng-
land; but hitherto the mule-deer has offered an even more
difficult problem in captivity than the pronghorn ante-
lope. Doubtless the difficulty would be minimized if
the effort at domestication were made in the neighbor-
hood of the Rocky Mountains.
The true way to preserve the mule-deer, however,
as well as our other game, is to establish on the nation's
property great nurseries and wintering grounds, such as
the Yellowstone Park, and then to secure fair play for
the deer outside these grounds by a wisely planned and
faithfully executed series of game laws. This is the
really democratic method of solving the problem. Oc-
casionally even yet some one will assert that the game
*' belongs to the people, and should be given over to
them " — meaning, thereby, that there should be no game
laws, and that every man should be at liberty indiscrimi-
nately to kill every kind of wild animal, harmless, useless,
or noxious, until the day when our woods become wholly
THE MULE-DEER 253
bereft of all the forms of higher animal life. Such an
argument can only be made from the standpoint of those
big game dealers in the cities who care nothing for the
future, and desire to make money at the present day by
a slaughter which in the last analysis only benefits the
wealthy people who are able to pay for the game; for
once the game has been destroyed, the livelihood of the
professional gunner will be taken away. Most emphati-
cally wild game not on private property does belong to
the people, and the only way in which the people can
secure their ownership is by protecting it in the interest
of all against the vandal few. As we grow older I think
most of us become less keen about that part of the hunt
which consists in the killing. I know that as far as I
am concerned I have long gone past the stage when the
chief end of a hunting trip was the bag. One or two
bucks, or enough grouse and trout to keep the camp sup-
plied, will furnish all the sport necessary to give zest
and point to a trip in the wilderness. When hunters
proceed on such a plan they do practically no damage
to the game. Those who are not willing to act along these
lines of their own free will, should be made to by the
State. The people of Montana, Wyoming, and Colorado,
and of the States near by, can do a real service, primarily
to themselves, but secondarily to others also, by framing
and executing laws which will keep these noble deer as
permanent denizens of their lofty mountains and beauti-
ful valleys. There are other things much more impor-
tant than game laws; but it will be a great mistake to
imagine, because until recently in Europe game laws have
254
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
been administered in the selfish interest of one class and
against the interest of the people as a whole, that here
in this country, and under our institutions, they would
not be beneficial to all of our people. So far from game
laws being in the interest of the few, they are emphatically
in the interest of the many. The very rich man can stock
a private game preserve, or journey afar off to where
game is still plentiful; but it is only where the game
is carefully preserved by the State that the man of small
means has any chance to enjoy the keen delight of the
chase.
There are many sides to the charm of big game hunt-
ing; nor should it be regarded as being without its solid
advantages from the standpoint of national character.
Always in our modern life, the life of a highly complex
industrialism, there is a tendency to softening of fibre.
This is true of our enjoyments; and it is no less true of
very many of our business occupations. It is not true
of such work as railroading, a purely modern develop-
ment, nor yet of work like that of those who man the
fishing fleets; but it is preeminently true of all occupa-
tions which cause men to lead sedentary lives in great
cities. For these men it is especially necessary to provide
hard and rough play. Of course, if such play is made
a serious business, the result is very bad; but this does
not in the least affect the fact that within proper limits
the play itself is good. Vigorous athletic sports carried
on in a sane spirit are healthy. The hardy out-of-door
sports of the wilderness are even healthier. It is a mere
truism to say that the qualities developed by the hunter
THE MULE-DEER
^55
are the qualities needed by the soldier; and a curious
feature of the changed conditions of modern warfare is
that they call, to a much greater extent than during the
two or three centuries immediately past, for the very
qualities of individual initiative, ability to live and work
in the open, and personal skill in the management of
horse and weapons, which are fostered by a hunter's life.
No training in the barracks or on the parade-ground is
as good as the training given by a hard hunting trip in
which a man really does the work for himself, learns to
face emergencies, to study country, to perform feats of
hardihood, to face exposure and undergo severe labor.
It is an excellent thing for any man to be a good horse-
man and a good marksman, to be bold and hardy, and
wonted to feats of strength and endurance, to be able to
live in the open, and to feel a self-reliant readiness in any
crisis. Big game hunting tends to produce or develop
exactly these physical and moral traits. To say that it
may be pursued in a manner or to an extent which is
demoralizing, is but to say what can likewise be said of
all other pastimes and of almost all kinds of serious busi-
ness. That it can be abused either in the way in which
it is done, or the extent to which it is carried, does not
alter the fact that it is in itself a sane and healthy rec-
reation.
CHAPTER VIII
THE WAPITI, OR ROUND-HORNED ELK
The wapiti is the largest and stateliest deer in the
world. A full-grown bull is as big as a steer. The ant-
lers are the most magnificent trophies yielded by any
game animal of America, save the giant Alaskan moose.
When full grown they are normally of twelve tines ; fre-
quently the tines are more numerous, but the increase in
their number has no necessary accompaniment in increase
in the size of the antlers. The length, massiveness, rough-
ness, spread, and symmetry of the antlers must all be
taken into account in rating the value of a head. Antlers
over fifty inches in length are large; if over sixty, they
are gigantic. Good heads are getting steadily rarer under
the persecution which has thinned out the herds.
Next to the bison the wapiti is of all the big game
animals of North America the one whose range has
most decreased. Originally it was found from the Pacific
coast east across the AUeghanies, through New York to
the Adirondacks, through Pennsylvania into western
New Jersey, and far down into the mid-country of Vir-
ginia and the Carolinas. It extended northward into
Canada, from the Great Lakes to Vancouver; and south-
ward into Mexico, along the Rockies. Its range thus
corresponded roughly with that of the bison, except that
it went farther west and not so far north. In the early
256
THE WAPITI
257
colonial days so little heed was paid by writers to the
teeming myriads of game that it is difficult to trace the
wapiti's distribution in the Atlantic coast region. It was
certainly killed out of the Adirondacks long before the
period when the backwoodsmen were settling the val-
leys of the Alleghany Mountains; there they found the
elk abundant, and the stately creatures roamed in great
bands over Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, and Indiana
when the first settlers made their way into what are now
these States, at the outbreak of the Revolution. These
first settlers were all hunters, and they followed the wapiti
(or, as they always called it, the elk) with peculiar eager-
ness. In consequence its numbers were soon greatly
thinned, and about the beginning of the present century
it disappeared from that portion of its former range lying
south of the Great Lakes and between the Alleghanies
and the Mississippi. In the northern Alleghanies it held
its own much longer, the last individual of which I have
been able to get record having been killed in Pennsyl-
vania in 1869. Iri the forests of northern Wisconsin,
northern Michigan, and Minnesota wapiti existed still
longer, and a very few individuals may still be found.
A few are left in Manitoba. When Lewis and Clark and
Pike became the pioneers among the explorers, army of-
ficers, hunters, and trappers who won for our people the
great West, they found countless herds of wapiti through-
out the high plains country from the Mississippi River
to the Rocky Mountains. Throughout this region it was
exterminated almost as rapidly as the bison, and by the
early eighties tJiere only remained a few scattered indi-
258 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
viduals, in bits of rough country such as the Black Hills,
the sand-hills of Nebraska, and certain patches of Bad
Lands along the Little Missouri. Doubtless stragglers
exist even yet in one or two of these localities. But by
the time the great buflfalo herds of the plains were com-
pletely exterminated, in 1883, the wapiti had likewise
ceased to be a plains animal; the peculiar Californian
form had also been well-nigh exterminated.
The nature of its favorite haunts was the chief factor
in causing it to suffer more than any other game in
America, save the bison, from the persecution of hunters
and settlers. The boundaries of its range have shrunk
in far greater proportion than in the case of any of our
other game animals, save only the great wild ox, with
which it was once so commonly associated. The moose,
a beast of the forest, and the caribou, which, save in the
far North, is also a beast of the forest, have in most places
greatly diminished in numbers, and have here and there
been exterminated altogether from outlying portions of
their range; but the wapiti, which, when free to choose,
preferred to frequent the plains and open woods, has
completely vanished from nine-tenths of the territory
over which it roamed a century and a quarter ago. Al-
though it was never found in any one place in such enor-
mous numbers as the bison and the caribou, it nevertheless
went in herds far larger than the herds of any other
American game save the two mentioned, and was for-
merly very much more abundant within the area of its
distribution than was the moose within the area of its
distribution.
THE WAPITI 259
This splendid deer affords a good instance of the
difficulty of deciding what name to use in treating of our
American game. On the one hand, it is entirely undesir-
able to be pedantic ; and on the other hand, it seems a pity,
at a time when speech is written almost as much as spo-
ken, to use terms which perpetually require explanation
in order to avoid confusion. The wapiti is not properly
an elk at all; the term wapiti is unexceptionable, and it
is greatly to be desired that it should be generally adopted.
But unfortunately it has not been generally adopted.
From the time when our backwoodsmen first began to
hunt the animal among the foothills of the Appalachian
chains to the present day, it has been universally known
as elk wherever it has been found. In ordinary speech
it is never known as anything else, and only an occasional
settler or hunter would understand what the word wapiti
referred to. The book name is a great deal better than
the common name; but after all, it is only a book name.
The case is almost exactly parallel to that of the buffalo,
which was really a bison, but which lived as the buffalo,
died as the buffalo, and left its name imprinted on our
landscape as the buffalo. There is little use in trying
to upset a name which is imprinted in our geography in
hundreds of such titles as Elk Ridge, Elk Mountain, Elk-
horn River. Yet in the books it is often necessary to
call it the wapiti in order to distinguish it both from its
differently named close kinsfolk of the Old World, and
from its more distant relatives with which it shares the
name of elk.
Disregarding the Pacific coast form of Vancouver
26o AN AMERICAN HUNTER
and the Olympian Mountains, the wapiti is now a beast
of the Rocky Mountain region proper, especially in west-
ern Montana, Wyoming, and Colorado. Throughout
these mountains its extermination, though less rapid than
on the plains, has nevertheless gone on with melancholy
steadiness. In the early nineties it was still as abundant
as ever in large regions in western Wyoming and Mon-
tana and northwestern Colorado. In northwestern Colo-
rado the herds are now represented by only a few hundred
individuals. In western Montana they are scattered over
a wider region and are protected by the denser timber,
but are nowhere plentiful. They have nearly vanished
from the Big Horn Mountains. They are still abundant
in and around their great nursery and breeding-ground,
the Yellowstone National Park. If this park could be
extended so as to take in part of the winter range to the
south, it would help to preserve them, to the delight of
all lovers of nature, and to the great pecuniary benefit
of the people of Wyoming and Montana. But at present
the winter range south of the park is filling up with
settlers, and unless the conditions change, those among the
Yellowstone wapiti which would normally go south will
more and more be compelled to winter among the moun-
tains, which will mean such immense losses from starva-
tion and deep snow that the southern herds will be wo-
fully thinned.^ Surely all men who care for nature, no
less than all men who care for big game hunting, should
combine to try to see that not merely the States but the
Federal authorities make every effort, and are given every
* Steps in the direction indicated are now being taken by the Federal authorities.
THE WAPITI 261
power, to prevent the extermination of this stately and
beautiful animal, the lordliest of the deer kind in the
entire world.
The wapiti, like the bison, and even more than the
whitetail deer, can thrive in widely varying surround-
ings. It is at home among the high mountains, in the
deep forests, and on the treeless, level plains. It is rather
omnivorous in its tastes, browsing and grazing on all
kinds of trees, shrubs and grasses. These traits, and its
hardihood, make it comparatively easy to perpetuate in
big parks and forest preserves in a semi-wild condition;
and it has thriven in such preserves and parks in many
of the Eastern States. As it does not, by preference, dwell
in such tangled forests as are the delight of the moose
and the whitetail deer, it vanishes much quicker than
either when settlers appear in the land. In the mountains
and foothills its habitat is much the same as that of the
mule-deer, the two animals being often found in the im-
mediate neighborhood of each other. In such places the
superior size and value of the wapiti put it at a disad-
vantage in the keen struggle for life, and when the rifle-
bearing hunter appears upon the scene, it is killed out
long before its smaller kinsman.
Moreover, the wapiti is undoubtedly subject to queer
freaks of panic stupidity, or what seems like a mixture
of tameness and of puzzled terror. At these times a herd
will remain almost motionless, the individuals walking
undecidedly to and fro, and neither flinching nor giving
any other sign even when hit with a bullet. In the old
days it was not uncommon for a professional hunter to
262 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
destroy an entire herd of wapiti when one of these fits
of confusion was on them. Even nowadays they some-
times behave in this way. In 1897, Mr. Ansley Wilcox,
of Buffalo, was hunting in the Teton basin. He came
across a small herd of wapiti, the first he had ever seen,
and opened fire when a hundred and fifty yards distant.
They paid no heed to the shots, and after taking three or
four at one bull, with seemingly no effect, he ran in closer
and emptied his magazine at another, also seemingly
without effect, before the herd slowly disappeared.
After a few rods, both bulls fell; and on examination
it was found that all nine bullets had hit them.
To my mind, the venison of the wapiti is, on the
whole, better than that of any other wild game, though
its fat, when cooled, at once hardens, like mutton tallow.
In its life habits the wapiti differs somewhat from its
smaller relatives. It is far more gregarious, and is highly
polygamous. During the spring, while the bulls are
growing their great antlers, and while the cows have
very young calves, both bulls and cows live alone, each
individual for itself. At such time each seeks the most
secluded situation, often going very high up on the moun-
tains. Occasionally a couple of bulls lie together, mov-
ing around as little as possible. The cow at this time
realizes that her calf's chance of life depends upon her
absolute seclusion, and avoids all observation.
As the horns begin to harden the bulls thrash the
velvet off against quaking asp, or ash, or even young
spruce, splintering and battering the bushes and small
trees. The cows and calves begin to assemble; the bulls
THE WAPITI 263
seek them. But the bulls do not run the cows as among
the smaller deer the bucks run the does. The time of
the beginning of the rut varies in different places, but it
usually takes place in September, about a month earlier
than that of the deer in the same locality. The necks
of the bulls swell and they challenge incessantly, for, un-
like the smaller deer, they are very noisy. Their love and
war calls, when heard at a little distance amid the moun-
tains, have a most musical sound. Frontiersmen usually
speak of their call as " whistling," which is not an ap-
propriate term. The call may be given in a treble or in
a bass, but usually consists of two or three bars, first rising
and then falling, followed by a succession of grunts. The
grunts can only be heard when close up. There can
be no grander or more attractive chorus than the chal-
lenging of a number of wapiti bulls when two great herds
happen to approach one another under the moonlight or
in the early dawn. The pealing notes echo through the
dark valleys as if from silver bugles, and the air is filled
with the wild music. Where little molested the wapiti
challenge all day long.
They can be easiest hunted during the rut, the hunter
placing them, and working up to them, by the sound
alone. The bulls are excessively truculent and pugna-
cious. Each big one gathers a herd of cows about him
and drives all possible rivals away from his immediate
neighborhood, although sometimes spike bulls are al-
lowed to remain with the herd. Where wapiti are very
abundant, however, many of these herds may join to-
gether and become partially welded into a mass that may
264 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
contain thousands of animals. In the old days such huge
herds were far from uncommon, especially during the
migrations; but nowadays there only remain one or two
localities in which wapiti are sufficiently plentiful ever
to come together in bands of any size. The bulls are
incessantly challenging and fighting one another, and
driving around the cows and calves. Each keeps the
most jealous watch over his own harem, treating its mem-
bers with great brutality, and is selfishly indififerent to
their fate the instant he thinks his own life in jeopardy.
During the rut the erotic manifestations of the bull are
extraordinary.
One or two fawns are born about May. In the moun-
tains the cow usually goes high up to bring forth her
fawn. Personally I have only had a chance to observe
the wapiti in spring in the neighborhood of my ranch
in the Bad Lands of the Little Missouri. Here the cow
invariably selected some wild, lonely bit of very broken
country in which there were dense thickets and some wa-
ter. There was one such patch some fifteen miles from
my ranch, in which for many years wapiti regularly bred.
The breeding cow lay by herself, although sometimes the
young of the preceding year would lurk in the neigh-
borhood. For the first few days the calf hardly left the
bed, and would not move even when handled. Then it
began to follow the mother. In this particular region
the grass was coarse and rank, save for a few patches in
the immediate neighborhood of little alkali springs. Ac-
cordingly, it was not much visited by the cattle or by the
cowboys. Doubtless in the happier days of the past,
THE PACK TRAIN
THE WAPITI 265
when man was merely an infrequent interloper, the wapiti
cows had made their nurseries in pleasanter and more
fruitful valleys. But in my time the hunted creatures
had learned that their only chance was to escape observa-
tion. I have known not only cows with young calves, but
cows when the calves were out of the spotted coat, and
even yearlings, to try to escape by hiding — the great
beasts lying like rabbits in some patch of thick brush,
while I rode close by. The best hunting horse I ever
had, old Manitou, in addition to his other useful quali-
ties, would serve as a guard on such occasions. I would
leave him on a little hillock to one side of such a patch
of brush, and as he walked slowly about, grazing and
rattling his bridle chains, he would prevent the wapiti
breaking cover on that side, and give me an additional
chance of slipping around toward them — although if the
animal was a cow, I never molested it unless in dire
need of meat.
Most of my elk-hunting was done among the stupen-
dous mountain masses of the Rockies, which I usually
reached after a long journey, with wagon or pack-train,
over the desolate plains. Ordinarily I planned to get to
the hunting-ground by the end of August, so as to have
ample time. By that date the calves were out of the
spotted coat, the cows and the young of the preceding
year had banded, and the big bulls had come down to
join them from the remote recesses in which they had
been lying, solitary or in couples, while their antlers were
growing. Many bulls were found alone, or, if young,
in small parties; but the normal arrangement was for
266 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
each big bull to have his own harem, around the out-
skirts of which there were to be found lurking occasional
spike bulls or two-year-olds who were always venturing
too near and being chased ofif by the master bull. Fre-
quently several such herds joined together into a great
band. Before the season was fairly on, when the bulls
had not been worked into actual frenzy, there was not
much fighting in these bands. Later they were the scenes
of desperate combats. Each master bull strove to keep
his harem under his own eyes, and was always threaten-
ing and fighting the other master bulls, as well as those
bulls whose prowess had proved insufficient hitherto to
gain them a band, or who, after having gained one, had
been so exhausted and weakened as to succumb to some
new aspirant for the leadership. The bulls were calling
and challenging all the time, and there was ceaseless tur-
moil, owing to their fights and their driving the cows
around. The cows were more wary than the bulls, and
there were so many keen noses and fairly good eyes that
it was difficult to approach a herd; whereas the single
bulls were so noisy, careless, and excited that it was com-
paratively easy to stalk them. A rutting wapiti bull is as
wicked-looking a creature as can be imagined, swagger-
ing among the cows and threatening the young bulls, his
jaws mouthing and working in a kind of ugly leer.
The bulls fight desperately with one another. The
two combatants come together with a resounding clash
of antlers, and then push and strain with their mouths
open. The skin on their necks and shoulders is so thick
and tough that the great prongs cannot get through or
THE WAPITI 267
do more than inflict bruises. The only danger comes
when the beaten party turns to flee. The victor pursues
at full speed. Usually the beaten one gets off; but if by
accident he is caught where he cannot escape, he is very
apt to be gored in the flank and killed. Mr. Baillie-
Grohman has given a very interesting description of one
such fatal duel of which he was an eye-witness on a moon-
light night in the mountains. I have never known of the
bull trying to protect the cow from any enemy. He
battles for her against rivals with intense ferocity; but
his attitude toward her, once she is gained, is either that
of brutality or of indifference. She will fight for her
calf against any enemy which she thinks she has a chance
of conquering, although of course not against man. But
the bull leaves his family to their fate the minute he
thinks there is any real danger. During the rut he is
greatly excited, and does not fear a dog or a single wolf,
and may join with the rest of the herd of both sexes in
trying to chase off one or the other, should he become
aware of its approach. But if there is serious danger,
his only thought is for himself, and he has no compunc-
tions about sacrificing any of his family. When on the
move a cow almost always goes first, while the bull brings
up the rear.
In domestication the bulls are very dangerous to
human beings, and will kill a man at once if they can
get him at a disadvantage; but in a state of nature they
rarely indeed overcome their abject terror of humanity,
even when wounded and cornered. Of course, if the man
comes straight up to him where he cannot get away, a
268 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
wapiti will fight as, under like circumstances, a blacktail
or whitetail will fight, and equally, of course, he is then
far more dangerous than his smaller kinsfolk; but he is
not nearly so apt to charge as a bull moose. I have never
known but two authentic instances of their thus charg-
ing. One happened to a hunter named Bennett, on the
Little Missouri; the other to a gentleman I met, a doctor,
in Meeker, Colorado. The doctor had wounded his
wapiti, and as it was in the late fall, followed him easily
in the snow. Finally he came upon the wapiti standing
where the snow was very deep at the bottom of a small
valley, and on his approach the wapiti deliberately
started to break his way through the snow toward him,
and had almost reached him when he was killed. But
for every one such instance of a wapiti's charging there
are a hundred in which a bull moose has charged. Sena-
tor Redfield Proctor was charged most resolutely by a
mortally hurt bull moose which fell in the death throes
just before reaching him; and I could cite case after
case of the kind.
The wapiti's natural gaits are a walk and a trot. It
walks very fast indeed, especially if travelling to reach
some given point. More than once I have sought to over-
take a travelling bull, and have found myself absolutely
unable to do so, although it never broke its walk. Of
course, if I had not been obliged to pay any heed to cover
or wind, I could have run up on it; but the necessity
for paying heed to both handicapped me so that I was
actually unable to come up to the quarry as it swung
steadily on through woodland and open, over rough
THE WAPITI 269
ground and smooth. Wapiti have a slashing trot, which
they can keep up for an indefinite time and over any
kind of country. Only a good pony can overtake them
when they have had any start and have settled into this
trot. If much startled they break into a gallop — the
young being always much more willing to gallop than
the old. Their gallop is very fast, especially downhill.
But they speedily tire under it. A yearling or a two-year-
old can keep it up for a couple of miles. A heavy old
bull will be done out after a few hundred yards. I once
saw a band of wapiti frightened into a gallop down a
steep incline where there were also a couple of mule-
deer. I had not supposed that wapiti ran as fast as mule-
deer, but this particular band actually passed the deer,
though the latter were evidently doing their best; the
wapiti were well ahead, when, after thundering down the
steep, broken incline, they all disappeared into a belt
of woodland. In spite of their size, wapiti climb well
and go sure-footedly over difficult and dangerous ground.
They have a habit of coming out to the edges of cliffs,
or on mountain spurs, and looking over the landscape
beneath, almost as though they enjoyed the scenery.
What their real object is on such occasions I do not
know.
The nose of the wapiti is very keen. Its sight is much
inferior to that of the antelope, but about as good as a
deer's. Its hearing is also much like that of a deer.
When in country where it is little molested, it feeds and
moves about freely by day, lying down to rest at inter-
vals, like cattle. Wapiti oflfer especial attractions to the
270
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
hunter, and next to the bison are more quickly exter-
minated than any other kind of game. Only the fact that
they possessed a far wider range of habitat than either
the mule-deer, the prongbuck, or the moose, has enabled
them still to exist. Their gregariousness is also against
them. Even after the rut the herds continue together
until in midspring the bulls shed their antlers — for they
keep their antlers at least two months longer than deer.
During the fall, winter, and early spring wapiti are rov-
ing, restless creatures. Their habit of migration varies
with locality, as among mule-deer. Along the little Mis-
souri, as in the plains country generally, there was no
well-defined migration. Up to the early eighties, when
wapiti were still plentiful, the bands wandered far and
wide, but fitfully and irregularly, wholly without regard
to the season, save that they were stationary from May
to August. After 1883 there were but a few individuals
left, although as late as 1886 I once came across a herd
of nine. These surviving individuals had learned cau-
tion. The bulls only called by night, and not very
frequently then, and they spent the entire year in the
roughest and most out-of-the-way places, having the same
range both winter and summer. They selected tracts
where the ground was very broken and there was much
shrubbery and patches of small trees. This tree and
bush growth gave them both shelter and food; for they
are particularly fond of browsing on the leaves and ten-
der twig ends, though they also eat weeds and grass.
Wherever wapiti dwell among the mountains they
make regular seasonal migrations. In northwestern
THE WAPITI
271
Wyoming they spend the summer in the Yellowstone
National Park, but in winter some go south to Jackson's
Hole, while others winter in the park to the northeast.
In northwestern Colorado their migrations followed
much the same line as those of the mule-deer. In dif-
ferent localities the length of the migration, and even the
time, differed. There were some places where the shift
was simply from the high mountains down to their foot-
hills. In other places great herds travelled a couple of
hundred miles, so that localities absolutely barren one
month would be swarming with wapiti the next. In
some places the shift took place as early as the month
of August; in others not until after the rut, in October
or even November; and in some places the rut took place
during the migration.
No chase is more fascinating than that of the wapiti.
In the old days, when the mighty antlered beasts were
found upon the open plains, they could be followed upon
horseback, with or without hounds. Nowadays, when
they dwell in the mountains, they are to be killed only
by the rifle-bearing still-hunter. Needless butchery of
any kind of animal is repulsive, but in the case of the
wapiti it is little short of criminal. He is the grandest
of the deer kind throughout the world, and he has al-
ready vanished from most of the places where he once
dwelt in his pride. Every true sportsman should feel it
incumbent upon him to do all in his power to preserve
so noble a beast of the chase from extinction. No harm
whatever comes to the species from killing a certain num-
ber of bulls; but an excessive number should never be
272
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
killed, and no cow or calf should under any circumstances
be touched. Formerly, when wapiti were plentiful, it
would have been folly for hunters and settlers in the
unexplored wilderness not to kill wild game for their
meat, and occasionally a cow or a calf had to be thus
slain; but there is no excuse nowadays for a hunting party
killing anything but a full-grown bull.
In a civilized and cultivated country wild animals
only continue to exist at all when preserved by sports-
men. The excellent people who protest against all hunt-
ing, and consider sportsmen as enemies of wild life, are
ignorant of the fact that in reality the genuine sports-
man is by all odds the most important factor in keeping
the larger and more valuable wild creatures from total
extermination. Of course, if wild animals were allowed
to breed unchecked, they would, in an incredibly short
space of time, render any country uninhabitable by man
— a fact which ought to be a matter of elementary knowl-
edge in any community where the average intelligence
is above that of certain portions of Hindoostan. Equally,
of course, in a purely utilitarian community all wild ani-
mals are exterminated out of hand. In order to preserve
the wild life of the wilderness at all, some middle ground
must be found between brutal and senseless slaughter and
the unhealthy sentimentalism which would just as surely
defeat its own end by bringing about the eventual total
extinction of the game. It is impossible to preserve the
larger wild animals in regions thoroughly fit for agri-
culture; and it is perhaps too much to hope that the
larger carnivores can be preserved for merely aesthetic
THE WAPITI
273
reasons. But throughout our country there are large re-
gions entirely unsuited for agriculture, where, if the peo-
ple only have foresight, they can, through the power of
the State, keep the game in perpetuity. There is no hope
of preserving the bison permanently, save in large private
parks; but all other game, including not merely deer,
but the pronghorn, the splendid bighorn, and the stately
and beautiful wapiti, can be kept on the public lands, if
only the proper laws are passed, and if only these laws
are properly enforced.
Most of us, as we grow older, grow to care relatively
less for sport than for the splendid freedom and abound-
ing health of outdoor life in the woods, on the plains,
and among the great mountains; and to the true nature
lover it is melancholy to see the wilderness stripped of
the wild creatures which gave it no small part of its
peculiar charm. It is inevitable, and probably necessary,
that the wolf and the cougar should go; but the bighorn
and white goat among the rocks, the blacktail and wapiti
grouped on the mountain side, the whitetail and moose
feeding in the sedgy ponds — these add beyond measure
to the wilderness landscape, and if they are taken away
they leave a lack which nothing else can quite make
good. So it is of those true birds of the wilderness, the
eagle and the raven, and, indeed, of all the wild things,
furred, feathered, and finned.
A peculiar charm in the chase of the wapiti comes
from the wild beauty of the country in which it dwells.
The moose lives in marshy forests; if one would seek
the white goat or caribou of the northern Rockies, he
274 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
must travel on foot, pack on back; while the successful
chase of the bighorn, perhaps on the whole the manliest
of all our sports, means heart-breaking fatigue for any
but the strongest and hardiest. The prongbuck, again,
must be followed on the desolate, sun-scorched plains.
But the wapiti now dwells amid lofty, pine-clad moun-
tains, in a region of lakes and streams. A man can travel
in comfort while hunting it, because he can almost al-
ways take a pack-train with him, and the country is usu-
ally sufficiently open to enable the hunter to enjoy all
the charm of distant landscapes. Where the wapiti lives
the spotted trout swarm in the brooks, and the wood-
grouse fly upward to perch among the tree-tops as the
hunter passes them. When hunting him there is always
sweet cold water to be drunk at night, and beds of aro-
matic fir boughs on which to sleep, with the blankets
drawn over one to keep out the touch of the frost. He
must be followed on foot, and the man who follows him
must be sound in limb and wind. But his pursuit does
not normally mean such wearing exhaustion as is en-
tailed by climbing cliffs all day long after the white
goat. Whoever has hunted the wapiti, as he looks at his
trophies will always think of the great mountains with
the snow lying in the rifts in their sides; of the splashing
murmur of rock-choked torrents; of the odorous breath
of the pine branches; of tents pitched in open glades;
of long walks through cool, open forests; and of great
camp-fires, where the pitchy stumps flame like giant
torches in the darkness.
In the old days, of course, much of the hunting w^as
THE WAPITI 275
done on the open plains or among low, rugged hills. The
wapiti that I shot when living at my Little Missouri
ranch were killed under exactly the same conditions as
mule-deer. When I built my ranch-house, wapiti were
still not uncommon, and their shed antlers were very nu-
merous both on the bottoms and in places among the hills.
There was one such place a couple of miles from my
ranch in a stretch of comparatively barren but very broken
hill-country in which there were many score of these shed
antlers. Evidently a few years before this had been a
great gathering-place for wapiti toward the end of win-
ter. My ranch itself derived its name, " The Elkhorn,"
from the fact that on the ground where we built it were
found the skulls and interlocked antlers of two wapiti
bulls who had perished from getting their antlers fast-
ened in a battle. I never, however, killed a wapiti while
on a day's hunt from the ranch itself. Those that I killed
were obtained on regular expeditions, when I took the
wagon and drove ofif to spend a night or two on ground
too far for me to hunt it through in a single day from
the ranch. Moreover, the wapiti on the Little Missouri
had been so hunted that they had entirely abandoned the
diurnal habits of their kind, and it was a great advan-
tage to get on the ground early. This hunting was not
carried on amid the glorious mountain scenery which
marks the home of the wapiti in the Rockies; but the
surroundings had a charm of their own. All really wild
scenery is attractive. The true hunter, the true lover
of the wilderness, loves all parts of the wilderness, just
as the true lover of nature loves all seasons. There is
2/6 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
no season of the year when the country is not more at-
tractive than the city; and there is no portion of the wil-
derness, where game is found, in which it is not a keen
pleasure to hunt. Perhaps no other kind of country
quite equals that where snow lies on the lofty mountain
peaks, where there are many open glades in the pine for-
ests, and clear mountain lakes and rushing trout-filled
torrents. But the fantastic desolation of the Bad Lands,
and the endless sweep of the brown prairies, alike have
their fascination for the true lover of nature and lover
of the wilderness who goes through them on foot or on
horseback. As for the broken hill-country in which I
followed the wapiti and the mule-deer along the Little
Missouri, it would be strange indeed if any one found
it otherwise than attractive in the bright, sharp fall
weather. Long, grassy valleys wound among the boldly
shaped hills. The basins were filled with wind-beaten
trees and brush, which generally also ran alongside of the
dry watercourses down the middle of each valley. Cedars
clustered in the sheer ravines, and here and there groups
of elm and ash grew to a considerable height in the more
sheltered places. At the first touch of the frost the foliage
turned russet or yellow — the Virginia creepers crimson.
Under the cloudless blue sky the air was fresh and cool,
and as we lay by the camp-fire at night the stars shone
with extraordinary brilliancy. Under such conditions
the actual chase of the wapiti was much like that of the
mule-deer. They had been so hunted that they showed
none of the foolish traits which they are prone to exhibit
when bands are found in regions where they have been
THE WAPITI
277
little persecuted ; and they were easier to kill than mule-
deer simply because they were more readily tracked and
more readily seen, and offered a larger, and on the whole
a steadier, mark at which to shoot. When a small band
had visited a pool their tracks could be identified at once,
because in the soft ground the flexible feet spread and
yielded so as to leave the marks of the false hoofs. On
ordinary ground it was difficult to tell their footprints
from those of the yearling and two-year-old ranch cattle.
But the mountains are the true ground for the wapiti.
Here he must be hunted on foot, and nowadays, since he
has grown wiser, skill and patience, and the capacity to
endure fatigue and exposure, must be shown by the suc-
cessful hunter. My own wapiti-hunting has been done
in September and early October during the height of
the rut, and therefore at a time when the conditions were
most favorable for the hunter. I have hunted them in
many places throughout the Rockies, from the Big Horn
in western Wyoming to the Big Hole Basin in western
Montana, close to the Idaho line. Where I hunted, the
wapiti were always very noisy both by day and by night,
and at least half of the bulls that I killed attracted my
attention by their calling before I saw either them or their
tracks. At night they frequently passed close to camp,
or came nearly up to the picketed horses, challenging all
the time. More than once I slipped out, hoping to kill
one by moonlight, but I never succeeded. Occasionally,
when they were plentiful, and were restless and always
roving about, I simply sat still on a log, until one gave
me a chance. Sometimes I came across them while hunt-
278 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
ing through likely localities, going up or across wind,
keeping the sharpest lookout, and moving with great care
and caution, until I happened to strike the animals I
was after. More than once I took the trail of a band,
when out with some first-class woodsman, and after much
running, dodging, and slipping through the timber, over-
took the animals — though usually when thus merely fol-
lowing the trail I failed to come up with them. On two
different occasions I followed and came up to bands,
attracted by their scent. Wapiti have a strong, and, on
the whole, pleasing scent, like that of Alderney cattle,
although in old bulls it becomes offensively strong. This
scent is very penetrating. I once smelt a herd which was
lying quite still taking its noonday siesta, certainly half
a mile to the windward of me; and creeping up I shot
a good bull as he lay. On another occasion, while work-
ing through the tangled trees and underbrush at the bot-
tom of a little winding valley, I suddenly smelt wapiti
ahead, and without paying any further attention to the
search for tracks, I hunted cautiously up the valley, and
when it forked was able to decide by the smell alone
which way the wapiti had gone. He was going up
wind ahead of me, and his ground-covering walk kept
me at a trot in order to overtake him. Finally I saw
him, before he saw me, and then, by making a run to
one side, got a shot at him when he broke cover, and
dropped him.
It is exciting to creep up to a calling wapiti. If it
is a solitary bull, he is apt to be travelling, seeking the
cows, or on the lookout for some rival of weaker thews.
THE WAPITI 279
Under such circumstances only hard running will enable
the hunter to overtake him, unless there is a chance to
cut him off. If, however, he hears another bull, or has
a herd under him, the chances are that he is nearly sta-
tionary, or at least is moving slowly, and the hunter has
every opportunity to approach. In a herd the bull him-
self is usually so absorbed both with his cows and with
his rivals that he is not at all apt to discover the ap-
proaching hunter. The cows, however, are thoroughly
awake, and it is their eyes and keen noses for which the
hunter must look out. A solitary bull which is answer-
ing the challenge of another is the easiest of all to
approach. Of course, if there has been much hunting,
even such a bull is wary and is on the lookout for harm.
But in remote localities he becomes so absorbed in finding
out the whereabouts of his rival, and is so busy answer-
ing the latter's challenges and going through motions
of defiance, that with proper care it is comparatively
easy to approach him. Once, when within seventy yards
of such a bull, he partly made me out and started toward
me. Evidently he could not tell exactly what I was —
my buckskin shirt probably helping to puzzle him — and
in his anger and eagerness he did not think of danger
until it was too late. On another occasion I got up to
two bulls that were fighting, and killed both. In the
fights, weight of body seems to count for more than size
of antlers.
Once I spent the better part of a day in following a
wapiti bull before I finally got him. Generally when
hunting wapiti I have been with either one of my men
28o AN AMERICAN HUNTER
from the ranch or a hunter like Tazewell Woody, or John
Willis. On this particular occasion, however, I hap-
pened to be alone ; and though I have rarely been as suc-
cessful alone as when in the company of some thoroughly
trained and experienced plainsman or mountainman, yet
when success does come under such circumstances it is
always a matter of peculiar pride.
At the time, I was camped in a beautiful valley
high among the mountains which divide southwestern
Montana from Idaho. The weather was cold, and there
were a couple of inches of snow on the ground, so that
the conditions were favorable for tracking and stalking.
The country was well wooded, but the forest was not
dense, and there were many open glades. Early one
morning, just about dawn, the cook, who had been up for
a few minutes, waked me, to say that a bull wapiti was
calling not far off. I rolled out of my bed and was
dressed in short order. The bull had by this time passed
the camp, and was travelling toward a range of moun-
tains on the other side of the stream which ran down the
valley bottom. He was evidently not alarmed, for he
was still challenging. I gulped down a cup of hot coffee,
munched a piece of hardtack, and thrust four or five other
pieces and a cold elk tongue into my hunting-shirt, and
then, as it had grown light enough to travel, started after
the wapiti. I supposed that in a few minutes I should
either have overtaken him or abandoned the pursuit, and
I took the food with me simply because in the wilderness
it never pays to be unprepared for emergencies. The
wisdom of such a course was shown in this instance by
THE WAPITI 281
the fact that I did not see camp again until long after
dark.
I at first tried to cut off the wapiti by trotting through
the woods toward the pass for which I supposed he was
headed. The morning was cold, and, as always happens
at the outset when one starts to take violent exercise under
such circumstances, the running caused me to break into
a perspiration; so that the first time I stopped to listen
for the wapiti a regular fog rose over my glasses and
then froze on them. I could not see a thing, and after
wiping them found I had to keep gently moving in order
to prevent them from clouding over again. It is on
such cold mornings, or else in very rainy weather, that
the man who has not been gifted with good eyes is most
sensible of his limitations. I once lost a caribou which
I had been following at speed over the snow because
when I came into sight and halted the moisture instantly
formed and froze on my glasses so that I could not see
anything, and before I got them clear the game had van-
ished. Whatever happened, I was bound that I should
not lose this wapiti from a similar accident.
However, when I next heard him he had evidently
changed his course and was going straight away from me.
The sun had now risen, and following after him I soon
found his tracks. He was walking forward with the
regular wapiti stride, and I made up my mind I had a
long chase ahead of me. We were going up hill, and
though I walked hard, I did not trot until we topped the
crest. Then I jogged along at a good gait, and as I had
on moccasins, and the woods were open, I did not have
282 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
to exercise much caution. Accordingly I gained, and
felt I was about to come up with him, when the wind
brought down from very far off another challenge. My
bull heard it before I did, and instantly started toward
the spot at a trot. There was not the slightest use of my
attempting to keep up with this, and I settled down into
a walk. Half an hour afterward I came over a slight
crest, and immediately saw a herd of wapiti ahead of me,
across the valley and on an open hillside. The herd was
in commotion, the master bull whistling vigorously and
rounding up his cows, evidently much excited at the new
bull's approach. There were two or three yearlings and
two-year-old bulls on the outskirts of the herd, and the
master bull, whose temper had evidently not been
improved by the coming of the stranger, occasionally
charged these and sent them rattling off through the
bushes. The ground was so open between me and them
that I dared not venture across it, and I was forced to lie
still and await developments. The bull I had been fol-
lowing and the herd bull kept challenging vigorously,
but the former probably recognized in the latter a heavier
animal, and could not rouse his courage to the point of
actually approaching and doing battle. It by no means
follows that the animal with the heaviest body has the best
antlers, but the hesitation thus shown by the bull I was
following made me feel that the other would probably
yield the more valuable trophies, and after a couple of
hours I made up my mind to try to get near the herd,
abandoning the animal I had been after.
The herd showed but little symptoms of moving, the
THE WAPITI 283
cows when let alone scattering out to graze, and some
of them even lying down. Accordingly I did not hurry
myself, and spent considerably over an hour in slipping
off to the right and approaching through a belt of small
firs. Unfortunately, however, the wind had slightly
shifted, and while I was out of sight of the herd they had
also come down toward the spot, from whence I had been
watching them. Accordingly, just as I was beginning
to creep forward with the utmost caution, expecting to
see them at any moment, I heard a thumping and crack-
ing of branches that showed they were on the run. With
wapiti there is always a chance of overtaking them after
they have first started, because they tack and veer and
halt to look around. Therefore I ran forward as fast
as I could through the woods ; but when I came to the
edge of the fir belt I saw that the herd were several hun-
dred yards off. They were clustered together and look-
ing back, and saw me at once.
Off they started again. The old bull, however, had
neither seen me nor smelt me, and when I heard his
whistle of rage I knew he had misinterpreted the reason
for the departure of his cows, and in another moment he
came in sight, evidently bent on rounding them up. On
his way he attacked and drove off one of the yearlings,
and then took after the cows, while the yearling ran toward
the outlying bull. The latter evidently failed to under-
stand what had happened; at least he showed no signs of
alarm. Neither, however, did he attempt to follow the
fleeing herd, but started off again on his own line.
I was sure the herd would not stop for some miles,
284 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
and accordingly I resumed my chase of the single bull.
He walked for certainly three miles before he again
halted, and I was then half a mile behind him. On this
occasion he struck a small belt of woodland and began
to travel to and fro through it, probably with an idea of
lying down. I was able to get up fairly close by crawl-
ing on all-fours through the snow for part of the distance ;
but just as I was about to fire he moved slightly, and
though my shot hit him, it went a little too far back.
He plunged over the hill crest and was off at a gallop,
and after running forward and failing to overtake him in
the first rush, I sat down to consider matters. The snow
had begun to melt under the sun, and my knees and the
lower parts of my sleeves were wet from my crawl, and I
was tired and hungry and very angry at having failed to
kill the wapiti. It was, however, early in the afternoon,
and I thought that if I let the wapiti alone for an hour,
he would lie down, and then grow stiff and reluctant to
get up ; while in the snow I was sure I could easily follow
his tracks. Therefore I ate my lunch, and then swal-
lowed some mouthfuls of snow in lieu of drinking.
An hour afterward I took the trail. It was evident
the bull was hard hit, but even after he had changed his
plunging gallop for a trot he showed no signs of stop-
ping; fortunately his trail did not cross any other. The
blood signs grew infrequent, and two or three times he
went up places which made it difficult for me to believe
he was much hurt. At last, however, I came to where
he had lain down; but he had risen again and gone for-
ward. For a moment I feared that my approach had
THE WAPITI 285
alarmed him, but this was evidently not the case, for he
was now walking. I left the trail, and turning to one
side below the wind I took a long circle and again struck
back to the bottom of the valley down which the wapiti
had been travelling. The timber here was quite thick,
and I moved very cautiously, continually halting and
listening for five or ten minutes. Not a sound did I
hear, and I crossed the valley bottom and began to ascend
the other side without finding the trail. Unless he had
turned off up the mountains I knew that this meant he
must have lain down; so I retraced my steps and with
extreme caution began to make my way up the valley.
Finally I came to a little opening, and after peering about
for five minutes I stepped forward, and instantly heard
a struggling and crashing in a clump of young spruce on
the other side. It was the wapiti trying to get on his
feet. I ran forward at my best pace, and as he was stiff
and slow in his movements I was within seventy yards
before he got fairly under way. Dropping on one knee,
I fired and hit him in the flank. At the moment I could
not tell whether or not I had missed him, for he gave
no sign; but, running forward very fast, I speedily saw
him standing with his head down. He heard me and
again started, but at the third bullet down he went in his
tracks, the antlers clattering loudly on the branches of
a dead tree.
The snow was melting fast, and for fear it might go
off entirely, so that I could not follow my back track, I
went up the hillside upon which the wapiti lay, and tak-
ing a dead tree dragged it down to the bottom, leaving
286 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
a long furrow. I then repeated the operation on the
opposite hillside, thus making a trace which it was im-
possible for any one coming up or down the valley to
overlook; and having conned certain landmarks by which
the valley itself could be identified, I struck toward camp
at a round trot; for I knew that if I did not get into the
valley where the tent lay before dark, I should have to
pass the night out. However, the last uncertain light of
dusk just enabled me to get over a spur from which I
could catch a glimpse of the camp-fire, and as I stumbled
toward it through the forest I heard a couple of shots,
which showed that the cook and packer were getting
anxious as to my whereabouts.
CHAPTER IX
WILDERNESS RESERVES; THE YELLOWSTONE PARK
The most striking and melancholy feature in connec-
tion with American big game is the rapidity with which
it has vanished. When, just before the outbreak of the
Revolutionary War, the rifle-bearing hunters of the back-
woods first penetrated the great forests west of the Alle-
ghanies, deer, elk, black bear, and even buffalo, swarmed
in what are now the States of Kentucky and Tennessee,
and the country north of the Ohio was a great and almost
virgin hunting-ground. From that day to this the shrink-
age has gone on, only partially checked here and there,
and never arrested as a whole. As a matter of historical
accuracy, however, it is well to bear in mind that many
writers, in lamenting this extinction of the game, have
from time to time anticipated or overstated the facts.
Thus as good an author as Colonel Richard Irving Dodge
spoke of the buffalo as practically extinct, while the great
Northern herd still existed in countless thousands. As
early as 1880 sporting authorities spoke not only of the
buffalo, but of the elk, deer, and antelope as no longer to
be found in plenty; and recently one of the greatest of
living hunters has stated that it is no longer possible to
find any American wapiti bearing heads comparable with
the red deer of Hungary. As a matter of fact, in the
287
288 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
early eighties there were still large regions where every
species of game that had ever been known within historic
times on our continent was still to be found as plentifully
as ever. In the early nineties there were still big tracts
of wilderness in which this was true of all game except
the buffalo; for instance, it was true of the elk in portions
of northwestern Wyoming, of the blacktail in northwest-
ern Colorado, of the whitetail here and there in the
Indian Territory, and of the antelope in parts of New
Mexico. Even at the present day there are smaller, but
still considerable, regions where these four animals are
yet found in abundance; and I have seen antlers of wapiti
shot since 1900 far surpassing any of which there is record
from Hungary. In New England and New York, as
well as New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, the whitetail
deer is more plentiful than it was thirty years ago, and
in Maine (and to an even greater extent in New Bruns-
wick) the moose, and here and there the caribou, have, on
the whole, increased during the same period. There is
yet ample opportunity for the big game hunter in the
United States, Canada and Alaska.
While it is necessary to give this word of warning to
those who, in praising time past, always forget the oppor-
tunities of the present, it is a thousandfold more neces-
sary to remember that these opportunities are, neverthe-
less, vanishing; and if we are a sensible people, we will
make it our business to see that the process of extinction
is arrested. At the present moment the great herds of
caribou are being butchered, as in the past the great herds
of bison and wapiti have been butchered. Every be-
WILDERNESS RESERVES 289
liever in manliness, and therefore in manly sport, and
every lover of nature, every man who appreciates the
majesty and beauty of the wilderness and of wild life,
should strike hands with the far-sighted men who wish
to preserve our material resources, in the effort to keep
our forests and our game beasts, game birds, and game
fish — indeed, all the living creatures of prairie, and
woodland, and seashore — from wanton destruction.
Above all, we should realize that the effort toward
this end is essentially a democratic movement. It is en-
tirely in our power as a nation to preserve large tracts of
wilderness, which are valueless for agricultural purposes
and unfit for settlement, as playgrounds for rich and poor
alike, and to preserve the game so that it shall continue
to exist for the benefit of all lovers of nature, and to give
reasonable opportunities for the exercise of the skill of the
hunter, whether he is or is not a man of means. But this
end can only be achieved by wise laws and by a resolute
enforcement of the laws. Lack of such legislation and
administration will result in harm to all of us, but most
of all in harm to the nature lover who does not possess
vast wealth. Already there have sprung up here and
there through the country, as in New Hampshire and the
Adirondacks, large private preserves. These preserves
often serve a useful purpose, and should be encouraged
within reasonable limits; but it would be a misfortune
if they increased beyond a certain extent or if they took
the place of great tracts of wild land, which continue as
such either because of their very nature, or because of
the protection of the State exerted in the form of making
290 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
them State or national parks or reserves. It is foolish to
regard proper game laws as undemocratic, unrepublican.
On the contrary, they are essentially in the interests of
the people as a whole, because it is only through their
enactment and enforcement that the people as a whole
can preserve the game and can prevent its becoming
purely the property of the rich, who are able to create and
maintain extensive private preserves. The wealthy man
can get hunting anyhow, but the man of small means is
dependent solely upon wise and well-executed game laws
for his enjoyment of the sturdy pleasure of the chase. In
Maine, in Vermont, in the Adirondacks, even in parts of
Massachusetts and on Long Island, people have waked
up to this fact, particularly so far as the common white-
tail deer is concerned, and in Maine also as regards the
moose and caribou. The effect is shown in the increase
in these animals. Such game protection results, in the
first place, in securing to the people who live in the neigh-
borhood permanent opportunities for hunting; and in the
next place, it provides no small source of wealth to the
locality because of the visitors which it attracts. A deer
wild in the woods is worth to the people of the neighbor-
hood many times the value of its carcass, because of the
way it attracts sportsmen, who give employment and leave
money behind them.
True sportsmen, worthy of the name, men who shoot
only in season and in moderation, do no harm whatever
to game. The most objectionable of all game destroyers
is, of course, the kind of game butcher who simply kills
for the sake of the record of slaughter, who leaves deer
WILDERNESS RESERVES 291
and ducks and prairie-chickens to rot after he has slain
them. Such a man is wholly obnoxious; and, indeed, so
is any man who shoots for the purpose of establishing a
record of the amount of game killed. To my mind this
is one very unfortunate feature of what is otherwise the
admirably sportsmanlike English spirit in these matters.
The custom of shooting great bags of deer, grouse, par-
tridges, and pheasants, the keen rivalry in making such
bags, and their publication in sporting journals, are
symptoms of a spirit which is most unhealthy from every
standpoint. It is to be earnestly hoped that every Ameri-
can hunting or fishing club will strive to inculcate among
its own members, and in the minds of the general pub-
lic, that anything like an excessive bag, any destruction
for the sake of making a record, is to be severely rep-
robated.
But after all, this kind of perverted sportsman, un-
worthy though he be, is not the chief actor in the de-
struction of our game. The professional skin or market
hunter is the real ofifender. Yet he is of all others the
man who would ultimately be most benefited by the pres-
ervation of the game. The frontier settler, in a thor-
oughly wild country, is certain to kill game for his own
use. As long as he does no more than this, it is hard
to blame him; although if he is awake to his own interests
he will soon realize that to him, too, the live deer is worth
far more than the dead deer, because of the way in which
it brings money into the wilderness. The professional
market hunter who kills game for the hide, or for the
feathers, or for the meat, or to sell antlers and other
292 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
trophies; the market men who put game in cold storage;
and the rich people, who are content to buy what they
have not the skill to get by their own exertions — these
are the men who are the real enemies of game. Where
there is no law which checks the market hunters, the
inevitable result of their butchery is that the game is
completely destroyed, and with it their own means of
livelihood. If, on the other hand, they were willing to
preserve it, they could make much more money by acting
as guides. In northwestern Colorado, at the present mo-
ment, there are still blacktail deer in abundance, and some
elk are left. Colorado has fairly good game laws, but
they are indififerently enforced. The country in which
the game is found can probably never support any but
a very sparse population, and a large portion of the sum-
mer range is practically useless for settlement. If the
people of Colorado generally, and above all the people
of the counties in which the game is located, would res-
olutely cooperate with those of their own number who
are already alive to the importance of preserving the
game, it could, without difficulty, be kept always as abun-
dant as it now is, and this beautiful region would be a
permanent health resort and playground for the people
of a large part of the Union. Such action would be a
benefit to every one, but it would be a benefit most of
all to the people of the immediate locality.
The practical common sense of the American people
has been in no way made more evident during the last
few years than by the creation and use of a series of
large land reserves — situated for the most part on the
WILDERNESS RESERVES 293
great plains and among the mountains of the West — in-
tended to keep the forests from destruction, and therefore
to conserve the water supply. These reserves are, and
should be, created primarily for economic purposes. The
semi-arid regions can only support a reasonable popula-
tion under conditions of the strictest economy and wisdom
in the use of the water supply, and in addition to their
other economic uses the forests are indispensably neces-
sary for the preservation of the water supply and for
rendering possible its useful distribution throughout the
proper seasons. In addition, however, to this economic
use of the wilderness, selected portions of it have been
kept here and there in a state of nature, not merely for
the sake of preserving the forests and the water, but for
the sake of preserving all its beauties and wonders un-
spoiled by greedy and short-sighted vandalism. What
has been actually accomplished in the Yellowstone Park
afifords the best possible object-lesson as to the desirability
and practicability of establishing such wilderness re-
serves. This reserve is a natural breeding-ground and
nursery for those stately and beautiful haunters of the
wilds which have now vanished from so many of the great
forests, the vast lonely plains, and the high mountain
ranges, where they once abounded.
On April 8, 1903, John Burroughs and I reached the
Yellowstone Park, and were met by Major John Pitcher
of the Regular Army, the Superintendent of the Park.
The Major and I forthwith took horses; he telling me
that he could show me a good deal of game while riding
up to his house at the Mammoth Hot Springs. Hardly
294 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
had we left the little town of Gardiner and gotten within
the limits of the Park before we saw prongbuck. There
was a band of at least a hundred feeding some distance
from the road. We rode leisurely toward them. They
were tame compared to their kindred in unprotected
places; that is, it was easy to ride within fair rifle range
of them; and though they were not familiar in the sense
that we afterwards found the bighorn and the deer to
be familiar, it was extraordinary to find them showing
such familiarity almost literally in the streets of a fron-
tier town. It spoke volumes for the good sense and
law-abiding spirit of the people of the town. During
the two hours following my entry into the Park we rode
around the plains and lower slopes of the foothills in
the neighborhood of the mouth of the Gardiner and
we saw several hundred — probably a thousand all told
— of these antelopes. Major Pitcher informed me that
all the pronghorns in the Park wintered in this neigh-
borhood. Toward the end of April or the first of May
they migrate back to their summering homes in the
open valleys along the Yellowstone and in the plains
south of the Golden Gate. While migrating they go
over the mountains and through forests if occasion de-
mands. Although there are plenty of coyotes in the Park,
there are no big wolves, and save for very infrequent
poachers the only enemy of the antelope, as indeed the
only enemy of all the game, is the cougar.
Cougars, known in the Park, as elsewhere through the
West, as "mountain lions," are plentiful, having increased
in numbers of recent years. Except in the neighborhood
WILDERNESS RESERVES 295
of the Gardiner River, that is within a few miles of Mam-
moth Hot Springs, I found them feeding on elk, which
in the Park far outnumber all other game put together,
being so numerous that the ravages of the cougars are of
no real damage to the herds. But in the neighborhood
of the Mammoth Hot Springs the cougars are noxious
because of the antelope, mountain sheep, and deer which
they kill; and the Superintendent has imported some
hounds with which to hunt them. These hounds are
managed by Buflfalo Jones, a famous old plainsman, who
is now in the Park taking care of the bufifalo. On this
first day of my visit to the Park I came across the car-
casses of a deer and of an antelope which the cougars had
killed. On the great plains cougars rarely get antelope,
but here the country is broken so that the big cats can
make their stalks under favorable circumstances. To
deer and mountain sheep the cougar is a most dangerous
enemy — much more so than the wolf.
The antelope we saw were usually in bands of from
twenty to one hundred and fifty, and they travelled strung
out almost in single file, though those in the rear would
sometimes bunch up. I did not try to stalk them, but
got as near them as I could on horseback. The closest
approach I was able to make was to within about eighty
yards of two which were by themselves — I think a doe
and a last year's fawn. As I was riding up to them,
although they looked suspiciously at me, one actually lay
down. When I was passing them at about eighty yards'
distance the big one became nervous, gave a sudden jump,
and away the two went at full speed.
296 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
Why the prongbucks were so comparatively shy I
do not know, for right on the ground with them we came
upon deer, and, in the immediate neighborhood, moun-
tain sheep, which were absurdly tame. The mountain
sheep were nineteen in number, for the most part does
and yearlings with a couple of three-year-old rams, but
not a single big fellow — for the big fellows at this sea-
son are off by themselves, singly or in little bunches, high
up in the mountains. The band I saw was tame to a
degree matched by but few domestic animals.
They were feeding on the brink of a steep washout
at the upper edge of one of the benches on the moun-
tain-side just below where the abrupt slope began. They
were alongside a little gully with sheer walls. I rode
my horse to within forty yards of them, one of them occa-
sionally looking up and at once continuing to feed. Then
they moved slowly oflf and leisurely crossed the gully to
the other side. I dismounted, walked around the head
of the gully, and moving cautiously, but in plain sight,
came closer and closer until I was within twenty yards,
when I sat down on a stone and spent certainly twenty
minutes looking at them. They paid hardly any atten-
tion to my presence — certainly no more than well-treated
domestic creatures would pay. One of the rams rose on
his hind legs, leaning his fore-hoofs against a little pine
tree, and browsed the ends of the budding branches. The
others grazed on the short grass and herbage or lay down
and rested — two of the yearUngs several times playfully
butting at one another. Now and then one would glance
in my direction without the slightest sign of fear — barely
WILDERNESS RESERVES 297
even of curiosity. I have no question whatever but that
with a little patience this particular band could be made
to feed out of a man's hand. Major Pitcher intends
during the coming winter to feed them alfalfa — for game
animals of several kinds have become so plentiful in the
neighborhood of the Hot Springs, and the Major has
grown so interested in them, that he wishes to do some-
thing toward feeding them during the severe weather.
After I had looked at the sheep to my heart's content,
I walked back to my horse, my departure arousing as
little interest as my advent.
Soon after leaving them we began to come across
blacktail deer, singly, in twos and threes, and in small
bunches of a dozen or so. They were almost as tame
as the mountain sheep, but not quite. That is, they al-
ways looked alertly at me, and though if I stayed still
they would graze, they kept a watch over my movements
and usually moved slowly off when I got within less than
forty yards of them. Up to that distance, whether on
foot or on horseback, they paid but little heed to me, and
on several occasions they allowed me to come much
closer. Like the bighorn, the blacktails at this time were
grazing, not browsing; but I occasionally saw them nib-
ble some willow buds. During the winter they had been
browsing. As we got close to the Hot Springs we came
across several whitetail in an open, marshy meadow.
They were not quite as tame as the blacktail, although
without any difficulty I walked up to within fifty yards
of them. Handsome though the blacktail is, the white-
tail is the most beautiful of all deer when in motion,
298 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
because of the springy, bounding grace of its trot and
canter, and the way it carries its head and white flag
aloft.
Before reaching the Mammoth Hot Springs we also
saw a number of ducks in the little pools and on the
Gardiner. Some of them were rather shy. Others —
probably those which, as Major Pitcher informed me,
had spent the winter there — were as tame as barn-yard
fowls.
Just before reaching the post the Major took me into
the big field where Buffalo Jones had some Texas and
Flathead Lake buffalo — bulls and cows — which he was
tending with solicitous care. The original stock of buf-
falo in the Park have now been reduced to fifteen or
twenty individuals, and their blood is being recruited by
the addition of buffalo purchased out of the Flathead
Lake and Texas Panhandle herds. The buffalo were at
first put within a wire fence, which, when it was built,
was found to have included both blacktail and whitetail
deer. A bull elk was also put in with them at one time,
he having met with some accident which made the Major
and Buffalo Jones bring him in to doctor him. When
he recovered his health he became very cross. Not only
would he attack men, but also buffalo, even the old and
surly master bull, thumping them savagely with his ant-
lers if they did anything to which he objected. The
buffalo are now breeding well.
When I reached the post and dismounted at the Ma-
jor's house, I supposed my experiences with wild beasts
were ended for the day; but this was an error. The
WILDERNESS RESERVES 299
quarters of the officers and men and the various hotel
buildings, stables, residences of the civilian officials, etc.,
almost completely surround the big parade-ground at
the post, near the middle of which stands the flag-pole,
while the gun used for morning and evening salutes is
well ofif to one side. There are large gaps between some
of the buildings, and Major Pitcher informed me that
throughout the winter he had been leaving alfalfa on the
parade-grounds, and that numbers of blacktail deer had
been in the habit of visiting it every day, sometimes as
many as seventy being on the parade-ground at once.
As spring-time came on the numbers diminished. How-
ever, in mid-afternoon, while I was writing in my room
in Major Pitcher's house, on looking out of the win-
dow I saw five deer on the parade-ground. They were
as tame as so many Alderney cows, and when I walked
out I got within twenty yards of them without any dif-
ficulty. It was most amusing to see them as the time
approached for the sunset gun to be fired. The notes of
the trumpeter attracted their attention at once. They
all looked at him eagerly. One of them resumed feeding,
and paid no attention whatever either to the bugle, the
gun or the flag. The other four, however, watched the
preparations for firing the gun with an intent gaze, and
at the sound of the report gave two or three jumps; then
instantly wheeling, looked up at the flag as it came down.
This they seemed to regard as something rather more sus-
picious than the gun, and they remained very much on
the alert until the ceremony was over. Once it was fin-
ished, they resumed feeding as if nothing had happened.
300 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
Before it was dark they trotted away from the parade-
ground back to the mountains.
The next day we rode off to the Yellowstone River,
camping some miles below Cottonwood Creek. It was
a very pleasant camp. Major Pitcher, an old friend, had
a first-class pack-train, so that we were as comfortable
as possible, and on such a trip there could be no pleasanter
or more interesting companion than John Burroughs —
" Oom John," as we soon grew to call him. Where
our tents were pitched the bottom of the valley was nar-
row, the mountains rising steep and cliff-broken on either
side. There were quite a number of blacktail in the
valley, which were tame and unsuspicious, although not
nearly as much so as those in the immediate neighborhood
of the Mammoth Hot Springs. One mid-afternoon three
of them swam across the river a hundred yards above our
camp. But the characteristic animals of the region were
the elk — the wapiti. They were certainly more numer-
ous than when I was last through the Park twelve years
before.
In the summer the elk spread all over the interior of
the Park. As winter approaches they divide, some going
north and others south. The southern bands, which, at
a guess, may possibly include ten thousand individuals,
winter out of the Park, for the most part in Jackson's
Hole — though of course here and there within the limits
of the Park a few elk may spend both winter and summer
in an unusually favorable location. It was the members
of the northern band that I met. During the winter time
they are nearly stationary, each band staying within a very
WILDERNESS RESERVES 301
few miles of the same place, and from their size and the
open nature of their habitat it is almost as easy to count
them as if they were cattle. From a spur of Bison Peak
one day, Major Pitcher, the guide Elwood Hofer, John
Burroughs and I spent about four hours with the glasses
counting and estimating the different herds within sight.
After most careful work and cautious reduction of esti-
mates in each case to the minimum the truth would per-
mit, we reckoned three thousand head of elk, all lying
or feeding and all in sight at the same time. An estimate
of some fifteen thousand for the number of elk in these
Northern bands cannot be far wrong. These bands do
not go out of the Park at all, but winter just within its
northern boundary. At the time when we saw them, the
snow had vanished from the bottoms of the valleys and
the lower slopes of the mountains, but remained as con-
tinuous sheets farther up their sides. The elk were for
the most part found up on the snow slopes, occasionally
singly or in small gangs — more often in bands of from
fifty to a couple of hundred. The larger bulls were high-
est up the mountains and generally in small troops by
themselves, although occasionally one or two would be
found associating with a big herd of cows, yearlings, and
two-year-olds. Many of the bulls had shed their antlers;
many had not. During the winter the elk had evidently
done much browsing, but at this time they were grazing
almost exclusively, and seemed by preference to seek out
the patches of old grass which were last left bare by the
retreating snow. The bands moved about very little, and
if one were seen one day it was generally possible to find
302
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
it within a few hundred yards of the same spot the next
day, and certainly not more than a mile or two ofif. There
were severe frosts at night, and occasionally light flurries
of snow; but the hardy beasts evidently cared nothing for
any but heavy storms, and seemed to prefer to lie in the
snow rather than upon the open ground. They fed at
irregular hours throughout the day, just like cattle; one
band might be lying down while another was feeding.
While travelling they usually went almost in single file.
Evidently the winter had weakened them, and they were
not in condition for running; for on the one or two occa-
sions when I wanted to see them close up I ran right into
them on horseback, both on level plains and going up
hill along the sides of rather steep mountains. One band
in particular I practically rounded up for John Bur-
roughs, finally getting them to stand in a huddle while
he and I sat on our horses less than fifty yards ofif. After
they had run a little distance they opened their mouths
wide and showed evident signs of distress.
We came across a good many carcasses. Two, a bull
and a cow, had died from scab. Over half the remainder
had evidently perished from cold or starvation. The
others, including a bull, three cows and a score of year-
lings, had been killed by cougars. In the Park the cou-
gar is at present their only animal foe. The cougars
were preying on nothing but elk in the Yellowstone Val-
ley, and kept hanging about the neighborhood of the big
bands. Evidently they usually selected some outlying
yearling, stalked it as it lay or as it fed, and seized it
by the head and throat. The bull which they killed was
WILDERNESS RESERVES 303
in a little open valley by himself, many miles from any
other elk. The cougar which killed it, judging from its
tracks, was a big male. As the elk were evidently rather
too numerous for the feed, I do not think the cougars
were doing any damage.
Coyotes are plentiful, but the elk evidently have no
dread of them. One day I crawled up to within fifty
yards of a band of elk lying down. A coyote was walking
about among them, and beyond an occasional look they
paid no heed to him. He did not venture to go within
fifteen or twenty paces of any one of them. In fact, ex-
cept the cougar, I saw but one living thing attempt to
molest the elk. This was a golden eagle. We saw sev-
eral of these great birds. On one occasion we had ridden
out to the foot of a sloping mountain side, dotted over
with bands and strings of elk amounting in the aggre-
gate probably to a thousand head. Most of the bands
were above the snow-line — some appearing away back
toward the ridge crests, and looking as small as mice.
There was one band well below the snow-line, and tow-
ard this we rode. While the elk were not shy or wary,
in the sense that a hunter would use the words, they were
by no means as familiar as the deer; and this particular
band of elk, some twenty or thirty in all, watched us
with interest as we approached. When we were still half
a mile off they suddenly started to run toward us, evi-
dently frightened by something. They ran quartering,
and when about four hundred yards away we saw that
an eagle was after them. Soon it swooped, and a year-
ling in the rear, weakly, and probably frightened by the
3^4
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
swoop, turned a complete somersault, and when it re-
covered its feet stood still. The great bird followed the
rest of the band across a little ridge, beyond which they
disappeared. Then it returned, soaring high in the heav-
ens, and after two or three wide circles, swooped down
at the solitary yearling, its legs hanging down. We
halted at two hundred yards to see the end. But the eagle
could not quite make up its mind to attack. Twice it
hovered within a foot or two of the yearling's head,
again flew ofl and again returned. Finally the yearling
trotted oft after the rest of the band, and the eagle re-
turned to the upper air. Later we found the carcass of
a yearling, with two eagles, not to mention ravens and
magpies, feeding on it; but I could not tell whether they
had themselves killed the yearling or not.
Here and there in the region where the elk were abun-
dant we came upon horses, which for some reason had
been left out through the winter. They were much
wilder than the elk. Evidently the Yellowstone Park is
a natural nursery and breeding-ground of the elk, which
here, as said above, far outnumber all the other game put
together. In the winter, if they cannot get to open water,
they eat snow; but in several places where there had been
springs which kept open all winter, we could see by the
tracks that they had been regularly used by bands of elk.
The men working at the new road along the face of the
cliffs beside the Yellowstone River near Tower Falls
informed me that in October enormous droves of elk
coming from the interior of the Park and travelling
northward to the lower lands had crossed the Yellow-
HLK IN SNOW
WILDERNESS RESERVES 305
stone just above Tower Falls. Judging by their descrip-
tion, the elk had crossed by thousands in an uninter-
rupted stream, the passage taking many hours. In fact
nowadays these Yellowstone elk are, with the exception
of the Arctic caribou, the only American game which
at times travel in immense droves like the buffalo of the
old days.
A couple of days after leaving Cottonwood Creek —
where we had spent several days — we camped at the Yel-
lowstone Canyon below Tower Falls. Here we saw a
second band of mountain sheep, numbering only eight —
none of them old rams. We were camped on the west
side of the canyon; the sheep had their abode on the op-
posite side, where they had spent the winter. It has
recently been customary among some authorities, espe-
cially the English hunters and naturalists who have
written of the Asiatic sheep, to speak as if sheep were
naturally creatures of the plains rather than mountain
climbers. I know nothing of the Old World sheep, but
the Rocky Mountain bighorn is to the full as character-
istic a mountain animal, in every sense of the word, as
the chamois, and, I think, as the ibex. These sheep
were well known to the road builders, who had spent the
winter in the locality. They told me they never went
back on the plains, but throughout the winter had spent
their days and nights on the top of the cliff and along
its face. This cliff was an alternation of sheer precipices
and very steep inclines. When qoated with ice it would
be difficult to imagine an uglier bit of climbing; but
throughout the winter, and even in the wildest storms,
3o6 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the sheep had habitually gone down it to drink at the
water below. When we first saw them they were lying
sunning themselves on the edge of the canyon, where the
rolling grassy country behind it broke off into the sheer
descent. It was mid-afternoon and they were under some
pines. After a while they got up and began to graze,
and soon hopped unconcernedly down the side of the clifif
until they were half-way to the bottom. They then
grazed along the sides, and spent some time licking at
a place where there was evidently a mineral deposit. Be-
fore dark they all lay down again on a steeply inclined
jutting spur midway between the top and bottom of the
canyon.
Next morning I thought I would like to see them
close up, so I walked down three or four miles below
where the canyon ended, crossed the stream, and came up
the other side until I got on what was literally the stamp-
ing-ground of the sheep. Their tracks showed that they
had spent their time for many weeks, and probably for
all the winter, within a very narrow radius. For perhaps
a mile and a half, or two miles at the very outside, they
had wandered to and fro on the summit of the canyon,
making what was almost a well-beaten path ; always very
near and usually on the edge of the cliff, and hardly ever
going more than a few yards back into the grassy plain-
and-hill country. Their tracks and dung covered the
ground. They had also evidently descended into the
depths of the canyon wherever there was the slightest
break or even lowering in the upper line of the basalt
cliffs. Although mountain sheep often browse in winter.
WILDERNESS RESERVES 307
I saw but few traces of browsing here; probably on the
sheer clifif side they always get some grazing.
When I spied the band they were lying not far from
the spot in which they had lain the day before, and in
the same position on the brink of the canyon. They saw
me and watched me with interest when I was two hun-
dred yards off, but they let me get up within forty yards
and sit down on a large stone to look at them, without
running off. Most of them were lying down, but a cou-
ple were feeding steadily throughout the time I watched
them. Suddenly one took the alarm and dashed straight
over the cliff, the others all following at once. I ran
after them to the edge in time to see the last yearling
drop off the edge of the basalt cliff and stop short on the
sheer slope below, while the stones dislodged by h^s hoofs
rattled down the canyon. They all looked up at me with
great interest, and then strolled off to the edge of a jut-
ting spur and lay down almost directly underneath me
and some fifty yards off. That evening on my return to
camp we watched the band make its way right down to
the river bed, going over places where it did not seem
possible a four-footed creature could pass. They halted
to graze here and there, and down the worst places they
went very fast with great bounds. It was a marvellous
exhibition of climbing.
After we had finished this horseback trip we went
on sleds and skis to the upper Geyser Basin and the Falls
of the Yellowstone. Although it was the third week in
April, the snow was still several feet deep, and only
thoroughly trained snow horses could have taken the
3o8 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
sleighs along, while around the Yellowstone Falls it was
possible to move only on snowshoes. There was little
life in those woods. In the upper basin I caught a
meadow mouse on the snow; I afterwards sent it to Hart
Merriam, who told me it was of a species he had de-
scribed from Idaho, Microtus nanus; it had not been
previously found in the Yellowstone region. We saw an
occasional pine squirrel, snowshoe rabbit or marten; and
in the open meadows around the hot waters there were
Canada geese and ducks of several species, and now and
then a coyote. Around camp Clark's crows and Stellar's
jays, and occasionally magpies, came to pick at the refuse;
and of course they were accompanied by the whiskey
jacks, which behaved with their usual astounding famil-
iarity. At Norris Geyser Basin there was a perfect
chorus of bird music from robins, western purple finches,
juncos and mountain bluebirds. In the woods there were
mountain chickadees and pygmy nuthatches, together
with an occasional woodpecker. In the northern coun-
try we had come across a very few blue grouse and rufifed
grouse, both as tame as possible. We had seen a pygmy
owl no larger than a robin sitting on the top of a pine in
broad daylight, and uttering at short intervals a queer
un-owl-like cry.
The birds that interested us most were the solitaires,
and especially the dippers or water-ousels. We were
fortunate enough to hear the solitaires sing not only when
perched on trees, but on the wing, soaring over a great
canyon. They are striking birds in every way, and their
habit of singing while soaring, and their song, are alike
WILDERNESS RESERVES 309
noteworthy. Once I heard a solitaire singing at the top
of a canyon, and an ousel also singing but a thousand feet
below him; and in this case I thought the ousel sang
better than his unconscious rival. The ousels are to my
mind wellnigh the most attractive of all our birds, be-
cause of their song, their extraordinary habits, their
whole personality. They stay through the winter in the
Yellowstone because the waters are in many places open.
We heard them singing cheerfully, their ringing melody
having a certain suggestion of the winter wren's. Usually
they sang while perched on some rock on the edge or
in the middle of the stream; but sometimes on the wing;
and often just before dipping under the torrent, or just
after slipping out from it onto some ledge of rock or
ice. In the open places the Western meadow lark was
uttering its beautiful song; a real song as compared to
the plaintive notes of its Eastern brother, and though
short, yet with continuity and tune as well as melody. I
love to hear the Eastern meadow lark in the early spring;
but I love still more the song of the Western meadow
lark. No bird escaped John Burroughs' eye; no bird
note escaped his ear.
I cannot understand why the Old World ousel should
have received such comparatively scant attention in the
books, whether from nature writers or poets; whereas
our ousel has greatly impressed all who know him. John
Muir's description comes nearest doing him justice. To
me he seems a more striking bird than for instance the
skylark; though of course I not only admire but am very
fond of the skylark. There are various pipits and larks
3IO
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
in our own country which sing in highest air, as does
the skylark, and their songs, though not as loud, are
almost as sustained; and though they lack the finer kind
of melody, so does his. The ousel, on the contrary, is a
really brilliant singer, and in his habits he is even farther
removed from the commonplace and the uninteresting
than the lark himself. Some birds, such as the ousel,
the mocking-bird, the solitaire, show marked originality,
marked distinction; others do not; the chipping sparrow,
for instance, while in no way objectionable (like the im-
ported house sparrow), is yet a hopelessly commonplace
little bird alike in looks, habits and voice.
On the last day of my stay it was arranged that I
should ride down from Mammoth Hot Springs to the
town of Gardiner, just outside the Park limits, and there
make an address at the laying of the corner-stone of the
arch by which the main road is to enter the Park. Some
three thousand people had gathered to attend the cere-
monies. A little over a mile from Gardiner we came
down out of the hills to the flat plain; from the hills we
could see the crowd gathered around the arch waiting
for me to come. We put spurs to our horses and cantered
rapidly toward the appointed place, and on the way we
passed within forty yards of a score of blacktails, which
merely moved to one side and looked at us, and within
almost as short a distance of half a dozen antelope. To
any lover of nature it could not help being a delightful
thing to see the wild and timid creatures of the wilderness
rendered so tame; and their tameness in the immediate
neighborhood of Gardiner, on the very edge of the Park,
WILDERNESS RESERVES 311
spoke volumes for the patriotic good sense of the citizens
of Montana. At times the antelope actually cross the
Park line to Gardiner, which is just outside, and feed
unmolested in the very streets of the town; a fact which
shows how very far advanced the citizens of Gardiner
are in right feeling on this subject; for of course the
Federal laws cease to protect the antelope as soon as they
are out of the Park. Major Pitcher informed me that
both the Montana and Wyoming people were cooperat-
ing with him in zealous fashion to preserve the game
and put a stop to poaching. For their attitude in this
regard they deserve the cordial thanks of all Americans
interested in these great popular playgrounds, where
bits of the old wilderness scenery and the old wilderness
life are to be kept unspoiled for the benefit of our chil-
dren's children. Eastern people, and especially Eastern
sportsmen, need to keep steadily in mind the fact that the
westerners who live in the neighborhood, of the forest
preserves are the men who in the last resort will deter-
mine whether or not these preserves are to be permanent.
They cannot in the long run be kept as forest and game
reservations unless the settlers roundabout believe in
them and heartily support them; and the rights of these
settlers must be carefully safeguarded, and they must be
shown that the movement is really in their interest. The
Eastern sportsman who fails to recognize these facts can
do little but harm by advocacy of forest reserves.
It was in the interior of the Park, at the hotels beside
the lake, the falls, and the various geyser basins, that
we would have seen the bears had the season been late
312 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
enough; but unfortunately the bears were still for the
most part hibernating. We saw two or three tracks, but
the animals themselves had not yet begun to come about
the hotels. Nor were the hotels open. No visitors had
previously entered the Park in the winter or early spring,
the scouts and other employees being the only ones who
occasionally traverse it. I was sorry not to see the bears,
for the effect of protection upon bear life in the Yellow-
stone has been one of the phenomena of natural history.
Not only have they grown to realize that they are safe,
but, being natural scavengers and foul feeders, they have
come to recognize the garbage heaps of the hotels as their
special sources of food supply. Throughout the summer
months they come to all the hotels in numbers, usually
appearing in the late afternoon or evening, and they have
become as indifferent to the presence of men as the deer
themselves — some of them very much more indifferent.
They have now taken their place among the recognized
sights of the Park, and the tourists are nearly as much
interested in them as in the geysers. In mussing over
the garbage heaps they sometimes get tin cans stuck on
their paws, and the result is painful. Buffalo Jones and
some of the other scouts in extreme cases rope the bear,
tie him up, cut the tin can off his paw, and let him go
again. It is not an easy feat, but the astonishing thing
is that it should be performed at all.
It was amusing to read the proclamations addressed
to the tourists by the Park management, in which they
were solemnly warned that the bears were really wild
animals, and that they must on no account be either fed
WILDERNESS RESERVES 313
or teased. It is curious to think that the descendants of
the great grizzlies which were the dread of the early ex-
plorers and hunters should now be semi-domesticated
creatures, boldly hanging around crowded hotels for the
sake of what they can pick up, and quite harmless so long
as any reasonable precaution is exercised. They are
much safer, for instance, than any ordinary bull or stall-
ion, or even ram, and, in fact, there is no danger from
them at all unless they are encouraged to grow too famil-
iar or are in some way molested. Of course among the
thousands of tourists there is a percentage of fools; and
when fools go out in the afternoon to look at the bears
feeding they occasionally bring themselves into jeopardy
by some senseless act. The black bears and the cubs of
the bigger bears can readily be driven up trees, and some
of the tourists occasionally do this. Most of the animals
never think of resenting it; but now and then one is run
across which has its feelings ruffled by the performance.
In the summer of 1902 the result proved disastrous to a
too inquisitive tourist. He was travelling with his wife,
and at one of the hotels they went out toward the garbage
pile to see the bears feeding. The only bear in sight was
a large she, which, as it turned out, was in a bad temper
because another party of tourists a few minutes before
had been chasing her cubs up a tree. The man left his
wife and walked toward the bear to see how close he
could get. When he was some distance ofif she charged
him, whereupon he bolted back toward his wife. The
bear overtook him, knocked him down and bit him se-
verely. But the man's wife, without hesitation, attacked
314 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the bear with that thoroughly feminine weapon, an um-
brella, and frightened her off. The man spent several
weeks in the Park hospital before he recovered. Per-
haps the following telegram sent by the manager of the
Lake Hotel to Major Pitcher illustrates with sufficient
clearness the mutual relations of the bears, the tourists,
and the guardians of the public weal in the Park. The
original was sent me by Major Pitcher. It runs :
"Lake. 7-27-'o3. Major Pitcher, Yellowstone: As
many as seventeen bears in an evening appear on my
garbage dump. To-night eight or ten. Campers and
people not of my hotel throw things at them to make them
run away. I cannot, unless there personally, control this.
Do you think you could detail a trooper to be there
every evening from say six o'clock until dark and make
people remain behind danger line laid out by Warden
Jones? Otherwise I fear some accident. The arrest
of one or two of these campers might help. My own
guests do pretty well as they are told. James Barton
Key. 9 A. M."
Major Pitcher issued the order as requested.
At times the bears get so bold that they take to mak-
ing inroads on the kitchen. One completely terrorized a
Chinese cook. It would drive him off and then feast
upon whatever was left behind. When a bear begins to
act in this way or to show surliness it is sometimes neces-
sary fo shoot it. Other bears are tamed until they will
feed out of the hand, and will come at once if called. Not
only have some of the soldiers and scouts tamed bears in
this fashion, but occasionally a chambermaid or waiter
GRIZZLY BEAR AND COOK
WILDERNESS RESERVES 315
girl at one of the hotels has thus developed a bear as
a pet.
The accompanying photographs not only show bears
very close up, with men standing by within a few yards
of them, but they also show one bear being fed from the
piazza by a cook, and another standing beside a particular
friend, a chambermaid in one of the hotels. In these
photographs it will be seen that some are grizzlies and
some black bears.
This whole episode of bear life in the Yellowstone is
so extraordinary that it will be well worth while for any
man who has the right powers and enough time, to make
a complete study of the life and history of the Yellow-
stone bears. Indeed, nothing better could be done by
some of our out-door faunal naturalists than to spend at
least a year in the Yellowstone, and to study the life
habits of all the wild creatuj-es therein. A man able to
do this, and to write down accurately and interestingly
what he had seen, would make a contribution of perma-
nent value to our nature literature.
In May, after leaving the Yellowstone, I visited the
Grand Canyon of the Colorado, and then went through
the Yosemite Park with John Muir — the companion
above all others for such a trip. It is hard to make com-
parisons among different kinds of scenery, all of them
very grand and very beautiful; but nothing that I have
ever seen has impressed me quite as much as the desolate
and awful sublimity of the Grand Canyon of the Colo-
rado. I earnestly wish that Congress would make it a
national park, and I am sure that such course would meet
3i6 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the approbation of the people of Arizona. The people
of California with wise and generous forethought have
given the Yosemite Valley to the National Government
to be kept as a national park, just as the surrounding
country, including some of the groves of giant trees, has
been kept. The flower-clad slopes of the Sierras — golden
with the blazing poppy, brilliant with lilies and tulips
and red-stemmed Manzinita bush — are unlike anything
else in this country. As for the giant trees, no words
can describe their majesty and beauty.
John Muir and I, with two packers and three pack
mules, spent a delightful three days in the Yosemite.
The first night was clear, and we lay in the open, on beds
of soft fir boughs, among the huge, cinnamon-colored
trunks of the sequoias. It was like lying in a great sol-
emn cathedral, far vaster and more beautiful than any
built by hand of man. Just at nightfall I heard, among
other birds, thrushes which I think were Rocky Moun-
tain hermits — the appropriate choir for such a place of
worship. Next day we went by trail through the woods,
seeing some deer — which were not wild — as well as
mountain quail and blue grouse. Among the birds which
we saw was a white-headed woodpecker; the interesting
carpenter woodpeckers were less numerous than lower
down. In the afternoon we struck snow, and had con-
siderable difficulty in breaking our trails. A snow-storm
came on toward evening, but we kept warm and com-
fortable in a grove of splendid silver firs — rightly named
" magnificent " — near the brink of the wonderful Yosem-
ite Valley. Next day we clambered down into it and
THE BEAR AND THE CHAMBERMAID
WILDERNESS RESERVES 317
at nightfall camped in its bottom, facing the giant cliffs
over which the waterfalls thundered.
Surely our people do not understand even yet the rich
heritage that is theirs. There can be nothing in the
world more beautiful than the Yosemite, the groves of
giant sequoias and redwoods, the Canyon of the Colorado,
the Canyon of the Yellowstone, the Three Tetons; and
our people should see to it that they are preserved for
their children and their children's children forever, with
their majestic beauty all unmarred.
CHAPTER X
BOOKS ON BIG GAME
The nineteenth century was, beyond all others, the
century of big game hunters, and of books about big
game. From the days of Nimrod to our own there have
been mighty hunters before the Lord, and most warlike
and masterful races have taken kindly to the chase, as
chief among those rough pastimes which appeal naturally
to men with plenty of red blood in their veins. But until
the nineteenth century the difficulties of travel were so
great that men of our race with a taste for sport could
rarely gratify this taste except in their own neighborhood.
The earlier among the great conquering kings of Egypt
and Assyria, when they made their forays into Syria and
the region of the Upper Euphrates, hunted the elephant
and the wild bull, as well as the lions with which the
country swarmed; and Tiglath-Pileser the First, as over-
lord of Phoenicia, embarked on the Mediterranean, and
there killed a " sea-monster," presumably a whale — a feat j
which has been paralleled by no sport-loving sovereign
of modern times, save by that stout hunter, the German
Kaiser; though I believe the present English King, like
several members of his family, has slain both elephants
and tigers before he came to the throne. But the ele-
318
BOOKS ON BIG GAME
319
phant disappeared from Eastern Asia a thousand years
before our era ; and the lion had become rare or unknown
in lands where the dwellers were of European stock, long
before the days of written records.
There was good hunting in Macedonia in the days of
Alexander the Great; there was good hunting in the Her-
cynian Forest when Frank and Bergund were turning
Gaul into France; there was good hunting in Lithuania
and Poland as late as the days of Sobieski; but the most
famous kings and nobles of Europe, within historic times,
though they might kill the aurochs and the bison, the bear
and the boar, had no chance to test their prowess against
the mightier and more terrible beasts of the tropics.
No modern man could be more devoted to the chase
than were the territorial lords of the Middle Ages.
Two of the most famous books of the chase ever written
were the Livre de Chasse of Count Gaston de Foix —
Gaston Phcebus, well known to all readers of Froissart
— and the translation or adaptation and continuation
of the same, the " Master of Game," by that Duke of
York who " died victorious " at Agincourt. Mr. Baillie-
Grohman, himself a hunter and mountaineer of wide
experience, a trained writer and observer, and a close
student of the hunting lore of the past, has edited and
reproduced the " Master of Game," in form which makes
it a delight to every true lover of books no less than to
every true lover of sport. A very interesting little book
is Glamorgan's Chasse du Loup^ dedicated to Charles the
Ninth of France; my copy is of the edition of 1566. The
text and the illustrations are almost equally attractive.
320 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
As the centuries passed it became more and more diffi-
cult to obtain sport in the thickly settled parts of Europe
save in the vast game preserves of the Kings and great
lords. These magnates of Continental Europe, dow^n to
the beginning of the last century, followed the chase
with all the ardor of Gaston Phoebus; indeed, they erred
generally on the side of fantastic extravagance and exag-
geration in their favorite pursuit, turning it into a solemn
and rather ridiculous business instead of a healthy and
vigorous pastime; but they could hunt only the beasts of
their own forests. The men who went on long voyages
usually had quite enough to do simply as travellers; the
occupation of getting into unknown lands, and of keeping
alive when once in them, was in itself sufficiently absorb-
ing and hazardous to exclude any chance of combining
with it the role of sportsman.
With the last century all this had changed. Even in
the eighteenth century it began to change. The Dutch
settlers at the Cape of Good Hope, and the English set-
tlers on the Atlantic coast of North America, found them-
selves thrown back into a stage of life where hunting was
one of the main means of livelihood, as well as the most
exciting and adventurous of pastimes. These men knew
the chase as men of their race had not known it since the
days before history dawned; and until the closing decades
of the last century the Americans and the Afrikanders of
the frontier largely led the lives of professional hunters.
Oom Paul and Buffalo Bill led very different careers
after they reached middle age ; but in their youth warfare
against wild beasts and wild men was the most serious
BOOKS ON BIG GAME
321
part of the life-work of both. They and their fellows
did the rough pioneer work of civilization, under condi-
tions which have now vanished for ever, and their type
will perish with the passing of the forces that called it
into being. But the big game hunter, whose campaigns
against big game are not simply incidents in his career as
a pioneer settler, will remain with us for some time
longer; and it is of him and his writings that we wish
to treat.
Toward the end of the eighteenth century this big
game hunter had already appeared, although, like all
early types, he was not yet thoroughly specialized. Le
Vaillant hunted in South Africa, and his volumes are ex-
cellent reading now. A still better book is that of Bruce,
the Abyssinian explorer, who was a kind of Burton of his
days, with a marvellous faculty for getting into quarrels,
but an even more marvellous faculty for doing work
which no other man could do. He really opened a new
world to European men of letters and science; who there-
upon promptly united in disbelieving all he said, though
they were credulous enough toward people who really
should have been distrusted. But his tales have been
proved true by many an explorer since then, and his book
will always possess interest for big game hunters, because
of his experiences in the chase. Sometimes he shot
merely in self-defense or for food, but he also made regu-
lar hunting trips in company with the wild lords of the
shifting frontier between dusky Christian and dusky in-
fidel. He feasted in their cane palaces, where the walls
were hung with the trophies of giant game, and in their
322
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
company, with horse and spear, he attacked and overcame
the buffalo and the rhinoceros.
By the beginning of the nineteenth century the hunt-
ing book proper became differentiated, as it were, from
the book of the explorer. One of the earliest was Will-
iamson's " Oriental Field Sports." This is to the present
day a most satisfactory book, especially to sporting par-
ents with large families of small children. The pictures
are all in colors, and the foliage is so very green, and the
tigers are so very red, and the boars so very black, and
the tragedies so uncommonly vivid and startling, that
for the youthful mind the book really has no formidable
rival outside of the charmed circle where Slovenly Peter
stands first.
Since then multitudes of books have been written
about big game hunting. Most of them are bad, of
course, just as most novels and most poems are bad; but
some of them are very good indeed, while a few are enti-
tled to rank high in literature — though it cannot be said
that as yet big game hunters as a whole have produced
such writers as those who dwell on the homelier and less
grandiose side of nature. They have not produced a
White or Burroughs, for instance. What could not Bur-
roughs have done if only he had cared for adventure and
for the rifle, and had roamed across the Great Plains and
the Rockies, and through the dim forests, as he has wan-
dered along the banks of the Hudson and the Potomac!
Thoreau, it is true, did go to the Maine Woods; but then
Thoreau was a transcendentalist and slightly anaemic.
A man must feel the beat of hardy life in his veins before
BOOKS ON BIG GAME 323
he can be a good big game hunter. Fortunately, Rich-
ard Jeffries has written an altogether charming little vol-
ume on the Red Deer, so that there is at least one game
animal which has been fully described by a man of letters,
who was also both a naturalist and a sportsman; but it is
irritating to think that no one has done as much for the
lordlier game of the wilderness. Not only should the
hunter be able to describe vividly the chase, and the life
habits of the quarry, but he should also draw the wilder-
ness itself, and the life of those who dwell or sojourn
therein. We wish to see before us the cautious stalk and
the headlong gallop ; the great beasts as they feed or rest
or run or make love or fight; the wild hunting camps;
the endless plains shimmering in the sunlight; the vast,
solemn forests; the desert and the marsh and the moun-
tain chain; and all that lies hidden in the lonely lands
through which the wilderness wanderer roams and hunts
game.
But there remain a goodly number of books which are
not merely filled with truthful information of impor-
tance, but which are also absorbingly interesting; and if
a book is both truthful and interesting it is surely entitled
to a place somewhere in general literature. Unfortu-
nately, the first requisite bars out a great many hunting
books. There are not a few mighty hunters who have
left long records of their achievements, and who undoubt-
edly did achieve a great deal, but who contrive to leave
in the mind of the reader the uncomfortable suspicion,
that besides their prowess with the rifle they were skilled
in the use of that more archaic weapon, the long bow.
324 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
" The Old Shekarry," who wrote of Indian and African
sport, was one of these. Gerard was a great lion-killer,
but some of his accounts of the lives, deaths, and espe-
cially the courtships, of lions, bear much less relation to
actual facts than do the novels of Dumas. Not a few
of the productions of hunters of this type should be
grouped under the head-lines used by the newspapers of
our native land in describing something which they are
perfectly sure hasn't happened — " Important, if True."
The exactly opposite type is presented in another French-
man, M. Foa, a really great hunter who also knows how
to observe and to put down what he has observed. His
two books on big game hunting in Africa have permanent
value.
If we were limited to the choice of one big game
writer, who was merely such, and not in addition a scien-
tific observer, we should have to choose Sir Samuel Baker,
for his experiences are very wide, and we can accept with-
out question all that he says in his books. He hunted
in India, in Africa, and in North America; he killed all
the chief kinds of heavy and dangerous game; and he
followed them on foot and on horseback, with the rifle
and the knife, and with hounds. For the same reason, if
we could choose but one work, it would have to be the
volumes of " Big Game Shooting," in the Badminton
Library, edited by Mr. Phillipps Wolley — himself a man
who has written well of big game hunting in out-of-the-
way places, from the Caucasus to the Cascades. These
volumes contain pieces by many dififerent authors; but
they dififcr from most volumes of the kind in that all the
BOOKS ON BIG GAME 325
writers are trustworthy and interesting; though the palm
must be given to Oswell's delightful account of his South
African hunting. The book on the game beasts of Africa
edited by Mr. Bryden is admirable in every way.
In all these books the one point to be insisted on is that
a big game hunter has nothing in common with so many
of the men who delight to call themselves sportsmen. Sir
Samuel Baker has left a very amusing record of the
horror he felt for the Ceylon sportsmen who, by the term
" sport," meant horse-racing instead of elephant shooting.
Half a century ago, Gordon-Cumming wrote of " the life
of the wild hunter, so far preferable to that of the mere
sportsman " ; and his justification for this somewhat sneer-
ing reference to the man who takes his sport in too artifi-
cial a manner, may be found in the pages of a then noted
authority on such sports as horse-racing and fox-hunting;
for in Apperly's " Nimrod Abroad," in the course of an
article on the game of the American wilderness, there
occurs this delicious sentence : " A damper, however, is
thrown over all systems of deer-stalking in Canada by the
necessity, which is said to be unavoidable, of bivouacking
in the woods instead of in well-aired sheets!" Verily,
there was a great gulf between the two men.
In the present century the world has known three
great hunting-grounds: Africa, from the equator to the
southernmost point; India, both farther and hither; and
North America west of the Mississippi, from the Rio
Grande to the Arctic Circle. The latter never ap-
proached either of the former in the wealth and variety
of the species, or in the size and terror of the chief beasts
326 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
of the chase; but it surpassed India in the countless num-
bers of the individual animals, and in the wild and un-
known nature of the hunting-grounds, while the climate
and surroundings made the conditions under which the
hunter worked pleasanter and healthier than those in
any other land.
South Africa was the true hunter's paradise. If the
happy hunting-grounds were to be found anywhere in
this world, they lay between the Orange and the Zambesi,
and extended northward here and there to the Nile coun-
tries and Somaliland. Nowhere else were there such
multitudes of game, representing so many and such widely
different kinds of animals, of such size, such beauty, such
infinite variety. We should have to go back to the fauna
of the Pleistocene to find its equal. Never before did
men enjoy such hunting as fell to the lot of those roving
adventurers, who first penetrated its hidden fastnesses,
camped by its shrunken rivers, and galloped over its sun-
scorched wastes; and, alas that it should be written, no
man will ever see the like again. Fortunately, its mem-
ory will forever be kept alive in some of the books that
the great hunters have written about it, such as Cornwallis
Harris' " Wild Sports of South Africa," Gordon-Cum-
ming's *' Hunter's Life in South Africa," Baldwin's
" African Hunting," Drummond's " Large Game and
Natural History of South Africa," and, best of all,
Selous' two books, " A Hunter's Wanderings in South
Africa " and " Travel and Adventure in Southeast
Africa." Selous was the last of the great hunters of
South Africa, and no other has left books of such value
BOOKS ON BIG GAME 327
as his. In central Africa the game has lasted to our own
time; the hunting described by Alfred Neumann and
Vaughn Kirby in the closing years of the nineteenth cen-
tury was almost as good as any enjoyed by their brothers
who fifty years before steered their ox-drawn wagons
across the " high veldt " of the south land.
Moreover, the pencil has done its part as well as the
pen. Harris, who was the pioneer of all the hunters,
published an admirable illustrated folio entitled " The
Game and Wild Animals of South Africa." It is per-
haps of more value than any other single work of the kind.
J. G. Millais, in "A Breath from the Veldt," has rendered
a unique service, not only by his charming descriptions,
but by his really extraordinary sketches of the South
African antelopes, both at rest, and in every imaginable
form of motion. Nearly at the other end of the continent
there is an admirable book on lion-hunting in Somali-
land, by Captain C. J. Melliss. Much information about
big game can be taken from the books of various mission-
aries and explorers; Livingstone and Du Chaillu doing
for Africa in this respect what Catlin did for North
America.
As we have said before, one great merit of these books
is that they are interesting. Quite a number of men who
are good sportsmen, as well as men of means, have written
books about their experiences in Africa; but the trouble
with too many of these short and simple annals of the rich
is, that they are very dull. They are not literature, any
more than treatises on farriery and cooking are literature.
To read a mere itinerary is like reading a guide-book.
328 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
No great enthusiasm in the reader can be roused by such
a statement as " this day walked twenty-three miles, shot
one giraffe and two zebras; porter deserted with the load
containing the spare boots " ; and the most exciting
events, if chronicled simply as " shot three rhinos and two
buffalo; the first rhino and both buffalo charged," become
about as thrilling as a paragraph in Baedeker. There
is no need of additional literature of the guide-book and
cookery-book kind. " Fine writing " is, of course, ab-
horrent in a way that is not possible for mere baldness of
statement, and would-be " funny " writing is even worse,
as it almost invariably denotes an underbred quality of
mind; but there is need of a certain amount of detail, and
of vivid and graphic, though simple, description. In
other words, the writer on big game should avoid equally
Carlyle's theory and Carlyle's practice in the matter of
verbosity. Really good game books are sure to contain
descriptions which linger in the mind just like one's pet
passages in any other good book. One example is Selous'
account of his night watch close to the wagon, when in
the pitchy darkness he killed three of the five lions which
had attacked his oxen; or his extraordinary experience
while hunting elephants on a stallion which turned sulky,
and declined to gallop out of danger. The same is true
of Drummond's descriptions of the camps of native hunt-
ing parties, of tracking wounded buffalo through the
reeds, and of waiting for rhinos by a desert pool under the
brilliancy of the South African moon; descriptions, by
the way, which show that the power of writing interest-
ingly is not dependent upon even approximate correctness
BOOKS ON BIG GAME
329
in style, for some of Mr. Drummond's sentences, in point
of length and involution, would compare not unfavorably
v^ith those of a Populist Senator discussing bimetallism.
Drummond is not as trustworthy an observer as Selous.
The experiences of a hunter in Africa, with its teem-
ing wealth of strange and uncouth beasts, must have been,
and in places must still be, about what one's experience
would be if one could suddenly go back a few hundred
thousand years for a hunting trip in the Pliocene or Pleis-
tocene. In Mr. Astor Chanler's book, " Through Jungle
and Desert," the record of his trip through the melan-
choly reed beds of the Guaso Nyiro, and of his re-
turn journey, carrying his wounded companion, through
regions where the caravan was perpetually charged by
rhinoceros, reads like a bit out of the unreckoned ages of
the past, before the huge and fierce monsters of old had
vanished from the earth, or acknowledged man as their
master. An excellent book of mixed hunting and scien-
tific exploration is Mr. Donaldson Smith's " Through
Unknown African Countries." If anything, the hunting
part is unduly sacrificed to some of the minor scientific
work. Full knowledge of a new breed of rhinoceros, or
a full description of the life history and chase of almost
any kind of big game, is worth more than any quantity
of matter about new spiders and scorpions. Small birds
and insects remain in the land, and can always be de-
scribed by the shoal of scientific investigators who follow
the first adventurous explorers; but it is only the pioneer
hunter who can tell us all about the far more interesting
and important beasts of the chase, the different kinds of
330 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
big game, and especially dangerous big game; and it is
a mistake in any way to subordinate the greater work to
the lesser.
Books on big game hunting in India are as plentiful,
and as good, as those about Africa. Forsyth's " High-
lands of Central India," Sanderson's " Thirteen Years
Among the Wild Beasts of India," Shakespeare's " Wild
Sports of India," and Kinloch's " Large Game Shoot-
ing," are perhaps the best; but there are many other
writers, like Markham, Baldwin, Rice, Macintyre, and
Stone, who are also very good. Indeed, to give even
a mere list of the titles of the good books on Indian
shooting would read too much like the Homeric cata-
logue of ships, or the biblical generations of the Jew-
ish patriarchs. The four books singled out for special
reference are interesting reading for anyone; particularly
the accounts of the deaths of man-eating tigers at the
hands of Forsyth, Shakespeare, and Sanderson, and some
of Kinloch's Himalayan stalks. It is indeed royal sport
which the hunter has among the stupendous mountain
masses of the Himalayas, and in the rank jungles and
steamy tropical forests of India.
Hunting should go hand in hand with the love of
natural history, as well as with descriptive and narrative
power. Hornaday's " Two Years in the Jungle " is espe-
cially interesting to the naturalist; but he adds not a little
to our knowledge of big game. It is earnestly to be
wished that some hunter will do for the gorilla what
Hornaday has done for the great East Indian ape, the
mias or orang.
BOOKS ON BIG GAME 331
There are many good books on American big game,
but, rather curiously, they are for the most part modern.
Until within the present generation Americans only
hunted big game if they were frontier settlers, profes-
sional trappers, Southern planters, army officers, or ex-
plorers. The people of the cities of the old States were
bred in the pleasing faith that anything unconcerned with
business was both a waste of time and presumably im-
moral. Those who travelled went to Europe instead of
to the Rocky Mountains.
Throughout the pioneer stages of American history,
big game hunting was not merely a pleasure, but a busi-
ness, and often a very important and in fact vital business.
At different times many of the men who rose to great
distinction in our after history took part in it as such:
men like Andrew Jackson and Sam Houston, for instance.
Moreover, aside from these pioneers who afterward won
distinction purely as statesmen or soldiers, there were
other members of the class of professional hunters — men
who never became eminent in the complex life of the
old civilized regions, who always remained hunters, and
gloried in the title — who, nevertheless, through and be-
cause of their life in the wilderness, rose to national fame
and left their mark on our history. The three most
famous men of this class were Daniel Boone, David
Crockett, and Kit Carson, who were renowned in every
quarter of the Union for their skill as game-killers, Ind-
ian-fighters, and wilderness explorers, and whose deeds
are still stock themes in the floating legendary lore of the
border. They stand for all time as types of the pioneer
332
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
settlers who won our land; the bridge-builders, the road-
makers, the forest-fellers, the explorers, the land-tillers,
the mighty men of their hands, who laid the foundations
of this great commonwealth.
There are good descriptions of big game hunting in
the books of writers like Catlin, but they come in inci-
dentally. Elliott's " South Carolina Field Sports " is a
very interesting and entirely trustworthy record of the
sporting side of existence on the old Southern plantations,
and not only commemorates how the planters hunted
bear, deer, fox, and wildcat on the uplands and in the
cane-brakes, but also gives a unique description of har-
pooning the great devil-fish in the warm Southern waters.
John Palliser, an Englishman, in his " Solitary Hunter,"
has given us the best descriptions of hunting in the far
West, when it was still an untrodden wilderness. An-
other Englishman, Ruxton, in two volumes, has left us a
most vivid picture of the old hunters and trappers them-
selves. Unfortunately, these old hunters and trappers,
the men who had most experience in the life of the wil-
derness, were utterly unable to write about it; they could
not tell what they had seen or done. Occasional attempts
have been made to get noted hunters to write books, either
personally or by proxy, but these attempts have not as
a rule been successful. Perhaps the best of the books
thus produced is Hittell's " Adventures of James Capen
Adams, Mountaineer and Grizzly Bear Hunter."
The first effort to get men of means and cultivation
in the Northern and Eastern States of the Union to look
at field sports in the right light was made by an English-
BOOKS ON BIG GAME 333
man who wrote over the signature of Frank Forrester.
He did much for the shotgun men; but, unfortunately,
he was a true cockney, who cared little for really wild
sports, and he was afflicted with that dreadful pedantry
which pays more heed to ceremonial and terminology
than to the thing itself. He was sincerely distressed be-
cause the male of the ordinary American deer was called
a buck instead of a stag; and it seemed to him to be a
matter of moment whether one spoke of a " gang " or a
" herd " of elk.
There are plenty of excellent books nowadays, how-
ever. The best book upon the old plains country was
Colonel Richard Irving Dodge's " Hunting-Grounds of
the Great West," which dealt with the chase of most
kinds of plains game proper. Judge Caton, in his " Ante-
lope and Deer of America," gave a full account of not
only the habits and appearance, but the methods of chase
and life histories of the prongbuck, and of all the dif-
ferent kinds of deer found in the United States. Dr.
Allen, in his memoir on the bisons of America, and
Hornaday, in his book upon their extermination, have
rendered similar service for the vast herds of shaggy-
maned wild cattle which have vanished with such mel-
ancholy rapidity during the lifetime of the present
generation. Mr. Van Dyke's " Still-Hunter " is a note-
worthy book, which, for the first time, approaches the
still-hunter and his favorite game, the deer, from what
may be called the standpoint of the scientific sportsman.
It is one of the few hunting-books which should really
be studied by the beginner because of what he can learn
334 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
therefrom in reference to the hunter's craft. The Cen-
tury Co.'s volume " Sport With Gun and Rod " contains
accounts of the chase of most of the kinds of American
big game, although there are two or three notable omis-
sions, such as the elk, the grizzly bear, and the white
goat. Warburton Pike, Caspar Whitney, and Frederick
Schwatka have given fairly full and very interesting ac-
counts of boreal sport; and Pendarves Vivian and Baillie-
Grohman of hunting trips in the Rockies. A new and
most important departure, that of photographing wild
animals in their homes, was marked by Mr. Wallihan's
" Camera Shots at Big Game." This is a noteworthy
volume. Mr. Wallihan was the pioneer in a work which
is of the utmost importance to the naturalist, the man
of science; and what he accomplished was far more
creditable to himself, and of far more importance to
others, than any amount of game-killing. Finally, in
Parkman's " Oregon Trail " and Irving's " Trip on the
Prairie," two great writers have left us a lasting record
of the free life of the rifle-bearing wanderers who first
hunted in the wild Western lands.
Though not hunting-books, John Burroughs' writ-
ings and John Muir's volumes on the Sierras should be
in the hands of every lover of outdoor life, and there-
fore in the hands of every hunter who is a nature lover,
and not a mere game-butcher.
Of course, there are plenty of books on European
game. Scrope's "Art of Deerstalking," Bromley Daven-
port's " Sport," and all the books of Charles St. John,
are classic. The chase of the wolf and boar is excellently
BOOKS ON BIG GAME 335
described by an unnamed writer in " Wolf-Hunting and
Wild Sports of Brittany." Baillie-Grohman's " Sport in
the Alps " is devoted to the mountain game of Central
Europe, and is, moreover, a mine of curious hunting lore,
most of which is entirely new to men unacquainted with
the history of the chase in Continental Europe during
the last few centuries. An entirely novel type of ad-
venture was set forth in Lamont's " Seasons with the Sea
Horses," wherein he described his hunting in arctic waters
with rifle and harpoon. Lloyd's " Scandinavian Ad-
ventures " and " Northern Field Sports," and Whishaw's
" Out of Doors in Tsar Land," tell of the life and game
of the snowy northern forests. Chapman has done ex-
cellent work for both Norway and Spain. It would
be impossible even to allude to the German and French
books on the chase, such as the admirable but rather
technical treatises of Le Couteulx de Canteleu. More-
over, these books for the most part belong rather in the
category which includes English fox-hunting literature,
not in that which deals with big game and the life of
the wilderness. This is merely to state a difference — not
to draw a comparison; for the artificial sports of highly
civilized countries are strongly to be commended for
their efifect on national character in making good the
loss of certain of the rougher virtues which tend to dis-
appear with the rougher conditions.
In Mr. Edward North Buxton's two volumes of
" Short Stalks " we find the books of a man who is a
hardy lover of nature, a skilled hunter, but not a game-
butcher; a man who has too much serious work on hand
336 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
ever to let himself become a mere globe-trotting rifleman.
His volumes teach us just what a big game hunter, a true
sportsman, should be. But the best recent book on the
wilderness is Herr C. G. Schilling's " Mit Blitzlicht und
Biichse," giving the writer's hunting adventures, and
above all his acute scientific observations and his extra-
ordinary photographic work among the teeming wild
creatures of German East Africa. Mr. Schilling is a
great field naturalist, a trained scientific observer, as well
as a mighty hunter; and no mere hunter can ever do work
even remotely approaching in value that which he has
done. His book should be translated into English at once.
Every efifort should be made to turn the modern big
game hunter into the Schilling type of adventure-loving
field naturalist and observer.
I am not disposed to undervalue manly outdoor sports,
or to fail to appreciate the advantage to a nation, as well
as to an individual, of such pastimes; but they must be
pastimes, and not business, and they must not be carried
to excess. There is much to be said for the life of a
professional hunter in lonely lands; but the man able
to be something more, should be that something more
— an explorer, a naturalist, or else a man who makes
his hunting trips merely delightful interludes in his life
work. As for excessive game butchery, it amounts to a
repulsive debauch. The man whose chief title to glory
is that, during an industrious career of destruction, he
has slaughtered 200,000 head of deer and partridges,
stands unpleasantly near those continental kings and
nobles who, curing the centuries before the French Rev-
BOOKS ON BIG GAME
337
olution, deified the chase of the stag, and made it into
a highly artificial cult, which they followed to the ex-
clusion of State-craft and war-craft and everything else.
James, the founder of the ignoble English branch of the
Stuart kings, as unkingly a man as ever sat on a throne,
was fanatical in his devotion to the artificial kind of chase
which then absorbed the souls of the magnates of con-
tinental Europe.
There is no need to exercise much patience with men
who protest against field sports, unless, indeed, they are
logical vegetarians of the flabbiest Hindoo type. If no
deer or rabbits were killed, no crops could be cultivated.
If it is morally right to kill an animal to eat its body,
then it is morally right to kill it to preserve its head. A
good sportsman will not hesitate as to the relative value
he puts upon the two, and to get the one he will go a long
time without eating the other. No nation facing the un-
healthy softening and relaxation of fibre which tend to
accompany civilization can afiford to neglect anything
that will develop hardihood, resolution, and the scorn of
discomfort and danger. But if sport is made an end in-
stead of a means, it is better to avoid it altogether. The
greatest stag-hunter of the seventeenth century was the
Elector of Saxony. During the Thirty Years' War he
killed some 80,000 deer and boar. Now, if there ever
was a time when a ruler needed to apply himself to
serious matters, it was during the Thirty Years' War in
Germany, and if the Elector in question had eschewed
hunting he might have compared more favorably with
Gustavus Adolphus in his own generation, or the Great
338 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
Elector of Brandenburg in the next generation. The
kings of the House of Savoy have shown that the love
of hardy field sports in no w^ay interferes with the exer-
cise of the highest kind of governmental ability.
Wellington was fond of fox-hunting, but he did very
little of it during the period of the Peninsular War.
Grant cared much for fine horses, but he devoted his at-
tention to other matters when facing Lee before Rich-
mond. Perhaps as good an illustration as could be wished
of the effects of the opposite course is furnished by poor
Louis XVL He took his sport more seriously than he
did his position as ruler of his people. On the day when
the revolutionary mob came to Versailles, he merely re-
corded in his diary that he had *' gone out shooting, and
had killed eighty-one head when he was interrupted by
events." The particular event to which this " interrup-
tion " led up was the guillotine. Not many sportsmen
have to face such a possibility; but they do run the risk
of becoming a curse to themselves and to everyone else,
if they once get into the frame of mind which can look
on the business of life as merely an interruption to sport.
CHAPTER XI
AT HOME
Only a few men, comparatively speaking, lead their
lives in the wilderness; only a few others, again speak-
ing comparatively, are able to take their holidays in the
shape of hunting trips in the wilderness. But all who
live in the country, or who even spend a month now
and then in the country, can enjoy outdoor life them-
selves, and can see that their children enjoy it in the hardy
fashion which will do them good. Camping out, and
therefore the cultivation of the capacity to live in the
open, and the education of the faculties which teach ob-
servation, resourcefulness, self-reliance, are within the
reach of all who really care for the life of the woods,
the fields, and the waters. Marksmanship with the rifle
can be cultivated with small cost or trouble; and if any
one passes much time in the country he can, if only he
chooses, learn much about horsemanship.
But aside from any such benefit, it is an incalculable
added pleasure to any one's sum of happiness if he or
she grows to know, even slightly and imperfectly, how to
read and enjoy the wonder-book of nature. All hunters
should be nature lovers. It is to be hoped that the days
of mere wasteful, boastful slaughter, are past, and that
from now on the hunter will stand foremost in working
339
340
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
for the preservation and perpetuation of the wild life,
whether big or little.
The Audubon Society and kindred organizations
have done much for the proper protection of birds and
of wild creatures generally; they have taken the lead in
putting a stop to wanton or short-sighted destruction, and
in giving effective utterance to the desires of those who
wish to cultivate a spirit as far removed as possible from
that which brings about such destruction. Sometimes,
however, in endeavoring to impress upon a not easily
aroused public the need for action, they in their zeal over-
state this need. This is a very venial error compared to
the good they have done; but in the interest of scientific
accuracy it is to be desired that their cause should not
be buttressed in such manner. Many of our birds have
diminished lamentably in numbers, and there is every
reason for taking steps to preserve them. There are wa-
ter birds, shore birds, game birds, and an occasional con-
spicuous bird of some other kind, which can only be
preserved by such agitation. It is also most desirable
to prevent the slaughter of small birds in the neighbor-
hood of towns. But I question very much whether there
has been any diminution of small-bird life throughout
the country at large. Certainly no such diminution has
taken place during the past thirty years in any region of
considerable size with which I am personally acquainted.
Take Long Island, for instance. During this period
there has been a lamentable decrease in the waders — the
shore-birds — which used to flock along its southern shore.
But in northern Long Island, in the neighborhood of my
RENOWN
From n photograph by Arthur Hewitt
AT HOME 341
own home, birds, taken as a whole, are quite as plentiful
as they were when I was a boy. There are one or two
species which have decreased in numbers, notably the
woodcock; while the passenger pigeon, which was then
a rarely seen straggler, does not now appear at all. Bob-
whites are less plentiful. On the other hand, some birds
have certainly increased in numbers. This is true, for
instance, of the conspicuously beautiful and showy scar-
let tanager. I think meadow larks are rather more
plentiful than they were, and wrens less so. Bluebirds
have never been common with us, but are now rather
more common than formerly. It seems to me as if the
chickadees were more numerous than formerly. Purple
grakles are more plentiful than when I was a boy, and
the far more attractive redwing blackbirds less so. But
these may all be, and doubtless some must be, purely
local changes, which apply only to our immediate neigh-
borhood. As regards most of the birds, it would be hard
to say that there has been any change. Of course, obvi-
ous local causes will now and then account for a partial
change. Thus, while the little green herons are quite
as plentiful as formerly in our immediate neighborhood,
the white-crowned night herons are not as plentiful, be-
cause they abandoned their big heronry on Lloyd's Neck
upon the erection of a sandmill close by. The only ducks
which are now, or at any time during the last thirty years
have been, abundant in our neighborhood are the surf-
ducks or scoters, and the old-squaws, sometimes known
as long-tailed or sou'-sou'-southerly ducks. From late
fall until early spring the continuous musical clangor of
342 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the great flocks of sou'-sou'-southerlies, sounding across
the steel-gray, wintry waves, is well known to all who
sail the waters of the Sound.
Neither the birds nor the flowers are as numerous on
Long Island, or at any rate in my neighborhood, as they
are, for instance, along the Hudson and near Washing-
ton. It is hard to say exactly why flowers and birds are
at times so local in their distribution. For instance, the
bobolinks hardly ever come around us at Sagamore Hill.
Within a radius of three or four miles of the house I do
not remember to have ever seen more than two or three
couples breeding. Sharp-tailed finches are common in
the marsh which lies back of our beach; but the closely
allied seaside finches and the interesting and attractive
little marsh wrens, both of which are common in vari-
ous parts of Long Island, are not found near our home.
Similarly, I know of but one place near our house where
the bloodroot grows; the may-flowers are plentiful, but
among hillsides to all appearance equally favored, are
found on some, and not on others. For wealth of bloom,
aside from the orchards, we must rely chiefly upon the
great masses of laurel and the many groves of locusts.
The bloom of the locust is as evanescent as it is fragrant.
During the short time that the trees are in flower the
whole air is heavy with the sweet scent. In the fall, in
the days of the aster and the golden-rod, there is no
such brilliant coloring on Long Island as farther north,
for we miss from among the forest hues the flaming
crimsons and scarlets of the northern maples.
Among Long Island singers the wood-thrushes are
HIS FIRST BUCK
AT HOME 343
the sweetest; they nest right around our house, and also
in the more open woods of oak, hickory, and chestnut,
where their serene, leisurely songs ring through the leafy
arches all day long, but especially at daybreak and in
the afternoons. Baltimore orioles, beautiful of voice
and plumage, hang their nests in a young elm near a
corner of the porch; robins, catbirds, valiant kingbirds,
song-sparrows, chippies, bright colored thistle-finches,
nest within a stone's throw of the house, in the shrub-
bery or among the birches and maples; grasshopper
sparrows, humble little creatures with insect-like voices,
nest almost as close, in the open field, just beyond the
line where the grass is kept cut; humming-birds visit
the honeysuckles and trumpet-flowers; chimney swallows
build in the chimneys; barn swallows nest in the stable
and old barn, wrens in the bushes near by. Downy
woodpeckers and many other birds make their homes
in the old orchard; during the migrations it is alive
with warblers. Towhees, thrashers, and Maryland yel-
low-throats build and sing in the hedges by the garden;
bush sparrows and dainty little prairie warblers in the
cedar-grown field beyond. Red-wing blackbirds haunt
the wet places. Chickadees wander everywhere; the
wood-pewees, red-eyed vireos, and black and white creep-
ers keep to the tall timber, where the wary, thievish
jays chatter, and the great-crested fly-catchers flit and
scream. In the early spring, when the woods are still
bare, when the hen-hawks cry as they soar high in the
upper air, and the flickers call and drum on the dead
trees, the strong, plaintive note of the meadow lark is
344 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
one of the most noticeable and most attractive sounds.
On the other hand, the cooing of the mourning doves
is most noticeable in the still, hot summer days. In
the thick tangles chats creep and flutter and jerk, and
chuckle and whoop as they sing; I have heard them sing
by night. The cedar birds offer the most absolute con-
trast to the chats, in voice, manner, and habits. They
never hide, they are never fussy or noisy; they always
behave as if they were so well-bred that it is impossible
to resent the inroads the soft, quiet, pretty creatures make
among the cherries. One flicker became possessed of a
mania to dig its hole in one corner of the house, just
under the roof. It hammered lustily at boards and
shingles, and returned whenever driven away; until at
last we were reluctantly forced to decree its death. Oven-
birds are very plentiful, and it seems to me that their
flight song is more frequently given after dusk than in
daylight. It is sometimes given when the whippoor-
wills are calling. In late June evenings, especially by
moonlight, but occasionally even when the night is dark,
we hear this song from the foot of the hill where the
woods begin. There seems to be one particular corner
where year after year one or more oven-birds dwell
which possess an especial fondness for this night-sing-
ing in the air. It is a pity the little eared owl is called
screech-owl. Its tremulous, quavering cry is not a
screech at all, and has an attraction of its own. These
little owls come up to the house after dark, and are fond
of sitting on the elk antlers over the gable. When the
moon is up, by choosing one's position, the little owl
ALGONQUIN AND SKIP
AT HOME 345
appears in sharp outline against the bright disk, seated
on his many-tined perch.
The neighborhood of Washington abounds in birds
no less than in flowers. There have been one or two
rather curious changes among its birds since John Bur-
roughs wrote of them forty years ago. He speaks of the
red-headed woodpecker as being then one of the most
abundant of all birds — even more so than the robin. It
is not uncommon now, and a pair have for three years
nested in the White House grounds; but it is at present
by no means an abundant bird. On the other hand, John
Burroughs never saw any mocking-birds, whereas during
the last few years these have been increasing in numbers,
and there are now several places within easy walking or
riding distance where we are almost sure to find them.
The mocking-bird is as conspicuous as it is attractive,
and when at its best it is the sweetest singer of all birds;
though its talent for mimicry, and a certain odd perversity
in its nature, often combine to mar its performances. The
way it flutters and dances in the air when settling in a
tree-top, its alert intelligence, its good looks, and the com-
parative ease with which it can be made friendly and
familiar, all add to its charm. I am sorry to say that
it does not nest in the White House grounds. Neither
does the wood-thrush, which is so abundant in Rock
Creek Park, within the city limits. Numbers of robins,
song-sparrows, sputtering, creaking purple grakles —
crow blackbirds — and catbirds nest in the grounds. So, I
regret to say, do crows, the sworn foes of all small birds,
and as such entitled to no mercy. The hearty, whole-
346 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
some, vigorous songs of the robins, and the sweet, home-
like strains of the song-sparrows are the first to be regu-
larly heard in the grounds, and they lead the chorus.
The catbirds chime in later; they are queer, familiar,
strongly individual birds, and are really good singers;
but they persist in interrupting their songs with cat-
like squalling. Two or three pairs of flickers nest
with us, as well as the red-headed woodpeckers above
mentioned; and a pair of furtive cuckoos. A pair of
orchard orioles nested with us one spring, but not
again; the redstarts, warbling vireos, and summer war-
blers have been more faithful. Baltimore orioles fre-
quently visit us, as do the scarlet tanagers and tufted
titmice, but for some reason they have not nested here.
This spring a cardinal bird took up his abode in the
neighborhood of the White House, and now and then
waked us in the morning by his vigorous whistling in
a magnolia tree just outside our windows. A Carolina
wren also spent the winter with us, and sang freely.
In both spring and fall the white-throated sparrows
sing while stopping over in the course of their migra-
tions. Their delicate, plaintive, musical notes are among
the most attractive of bird sounds. In the early spring
we sometimes hear the fox-sparrows and tree-sparrows,
and of course the twittering snow-birds. Later war-
blers of many kinds throng the trees around the house.
Rabbits breed in the grounds, and every now and then
possums wander into them. Gray squirrels are numer-
ous, and some of them so tame that they will eat out of
our hands. In spring they cut the flowers from the stately
PETER RABBIT
From a photograph, copyright, 1004, by E. S. Curtis
AT HOME 347
tulip trees. In the hot June days the indigo birds are
especially in evidence among the singers around Wash-
ington ; they do not mind the heat at all, but perch in the
tops of little trees in the full glare of the sun, and chant
their not very musical, but to my ears rather pleasing,
song throughout the long afternoons. This June two new
guests came to the White House in the shape of two little
saw-whet owls; little bits of fellows, with round heads,
and no head tufts, or " ears," I think they were the
young of the year; they never uttered the saw-whet
sound, but made soft snoring noises. They always ap-
peared after nightfall, when we were sitting on the south
porch, in the warm, starlit darkness. They were fear-
less and unsuspicious. Sometimes they flew noiselessly to
and fro, and seemingly caught big insects on the wing.
At other times they would perch on the iron awning-
bars, directly overhead. Once one of them perched over
one of the windows, and sat motionless, looking exactly
like an owl of Pallas Athene.
At Sagamore Hill we like to have the wood-folk and
field-folk familiar; but there are necessary bounds to such
familiarity where chickens are kept for use and where
the dogs are valued family friends. The rabbits and gray
squirrels are as plenty as ever. The flying squirrels and
chipmunks still hold their own; so do the muskrats in
the marshes. The woodchucks, which we used to watch
as we sat in rocking-chairs on the broad veranda, have
disappeared; but recently one has made himself a home
under the old barn, where we are doing our best to pro-
tect him. A mink which lived by the edge of the bay
348 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
under a great pile of lumber had to be killed; its lair
showed the remains not only of chickens and ducks, but
of two muskrats, and, what was rather curious, of two
skates or flatfish. A fox which lived in the big wood lot
evidently disliked our companionship and abandoned his
home. Of recent years I have actually seen but one fox
near Sagamore Hill. This was early one morning, when
I had spent the night camping on the wooded shores near
the mouth of Huntington Harbor. The younger chil-
dren were with me, this being one of the camping-out
trips, in rowboats, on the Sound, taken especially for their
benefit. We had camped the previous evening in a glade
by the edge of a low sea-bluff, far away from any house;
and while the children were intently watching me as I
fried strips of beefsteak and thin slices of potatoes in
bacon fat, we heard a fox barking in the woods. This
gave them a delightfully wild feeling, and with re-
freshing confidence they discussed the likelihood of
seeing it next morning; and to my astonishment see
it we did, on the shore, soon after we started to row
home.
One pleasant fall morning in 1892 I was writing in
the gun-room, on the top floor of the house, from the
windows of which one can see far over the Sound. Sud-
denly my small boy of five bustled up in great excite-
ment to tell me that the hired-man had come back from
the wood-pile pond — a muddy pool in a beech and
hickory grove a few hundred yards from the house — to
say that he had seen a coon and that I should come
down at once with my rifle; for Davis, the colored gar-
THE GUINEA-PIGS
AT HOME
349
dener, had been complaining much about the loss of his
chickens and did not know whether the malefactor was
a coon or a mink. Accordingly, I picked up a rifle and
trotted down to the pond holding it in one hand, while
the little boy trotted after me, affectionately clasping the
butt. Sure enough, in a big blasted chestnut close to
the pond was the coon, asleep in a shallow hollow of
the trunk, some forty feet from the ground. It was a
very exposed place for a coon to lie during the daytime,
but this was a bold fellow and seemed entirely undis-
turbed by our voices. He was altogether too near the
house, or rather the chicken-coops, to be permitted to
stay where he was — especially as but a short time before
I had, with mistaken soft-heartedness, spared a possum
I found on the place — and accordingly I raised my rifle;
then I remembered for the first time that the rear sight
was off, as I had taken it out for some reason; and in
consequence I underwent the humiliation of firing two
or three shots in vain before I got the coon. As he
fell out of the tree the little boy pounced gleefully on
him; fortunately he was dead, and we walked back to
the house in triumph, each holding a hind leg of the
quarry.
The possum spoken of above was found in a dogwood
tree not more than eighty yards from the house, one after-
noon when we were returning from a walk in the woods.
As something had been killing the hens, I felt that it was
at least under suspicion and that I ought to kill it, but
a possum is such an absurd creature that I could not
resist playing with it for some time; after that I felt that
35°
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
to kill it in cold-blood would be too much like murder,
and let it go. This tender-heartedness was regarded as
much misplaced both by farmer and gardener; hence the
coon suffered.
A couple of years later, on a clear, cold Thanksgiving
Day, we had walked off some five miles to chop out a
bridle-path which had become choked with down-tim-
ber; the two elder of our little boys were with us. The
sun had set long ere our return; we were walking home
on a road through our own woods and were near the
house. We had with us a stanch friend, a large yel-
low dog, which one of the children, with fine disregard
for considerations of sex, had named Susan. Suddenly
Susan gave tongue off in the woods to one side and we
found he had treed a possum. This time I was hard-
hearted and the possum fell a victim; the five-year-old
boy explaining to the seven-year-old that " it was the
first time he had ever seen a fellow killed."
Susan was one of many dogs whose lives were a joy
and whose deaths were a real grief to the family; among
them and their successors are or have been Sailor Boy,
the Chesapeake Bay dog, who not only loves guns, but
also fireworks and rockets, and who exercises a close and
delighted supervision over every detail of each Fourth
of July celebration; Alan and Jessie, the Scotch ter-
riers; and Jack, the most loved of all, a black smooth-
haired Manchester terrier. Jack lived in the house;
the others outside, ever on the lookout to join the family
in rambles through the woods. Jack was human in his
intelligence and affection; he learned all kinds of tricks.
AT HOME 351
was a high-bred gentleman, never brawled, and was a
dauntless fighter. Besides the family, his especial friend,
playfellow, and teacher was colored Charles, the foot-
man at Washington. Skip, the little black-and-tan ter-
rier that I brought back from the Colorado bear hunt,
changed at once into a real little-boy's dog. He never
lets his small master out of his sight, and rides on every
horse that will let him — by preference on Algonquin the
sheltie, whose nerves are of iron.
The first night possum hunt in which I ever took part
was at Quantico, on the Virginia side of the Potomac,
some twenty miles below Washington. It was a number
of years ago, and several of us were guests of a loved
friend, Hallett Phillips, since dead. Although no hunter,
Phillips was devoted to outdoor life. I think it was at
this time that Rudyard Kipling had sent him the manu-
script of " The Feet of the Young Men," which he read
aloud to us.
Quantico is an island, a quaint, delightful place, with
a club-house. We started immediately after dark, going
across to the mainland, accompanied by a dozen hounds,
with three or four negroes to manage them and serve as
axemen. Each member of the party carried a torch,
as without one it was impossible to go at any speed
through the woods. The dogs, of course, have to be spe-
cially trained not to follow either fox or rabbit. It was
dawn before we got back, wet, muddy, and weary, carry-
ing eleven possums. All night long we rambled through
the woods and across the fields, the dogs working about
us as we followed in single file. After a while some dog
352 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
would strike a trail. It might take some time to puzzle
it out; then the whole pack would be away, and all the
men ran helter-skelter after them, plunging over logs and
through swamps, and now and then taking headers in
the darkness. We were never fortunate enough to strike
a coon, which would have given a good run and a fight
at the end of it. When the unfortunate possum was over-
taken on the ground he was killed before we got up.
Otherwise he was popped alive into one of the big bags
carried by the axemen. Two or three times he got into a
hollow log or hole and we dug or chopped him out. Gen-
erally, however, he went up a tree. It was a picturesque
sight, in the flickering glare of the torches, to see the dogs
leaping up around the trunk of a tree and finally to make
out the possum clinging to the trunk or perched on some
slender branch, his eyes shining brightly through the
darkness; or to watch the muscular grace with which the
darky axemen, ragged and sinewy, chopped into any tree
if it had too large and smooth a trunk to climb. A pos-
sum is a queer, sluggish creature, whose brain seems to
work more like that of some reptile than like a mam-
mal's. When one is found in a tree there is no difficulty
whatever in picking it off with the naked hand. Two
or three times during the night I climbed the tree myself,
either going from branch to branch or swarming up some
tangle of grape-vines. The possum opened his mouth as
I approached and looked as menacing as he knew how;
but if I pulled him by the tail he forgot everything ex-
cept trying to grab with all four feet, and then I could
take him by the back of the neck and lift him off — either
AT HOME 353
carrying him down, held gingerly at arm's length, or
dropping him into the open mouth of a bag if I felt suf-
ficiently sure of my aim.
In the spring of 1903, while in western Kansas, a little
girl gave me a baby badger, captured by her brother, and
named after him, Josiah. I took Josiah home to Saga-
more Hill, where the children received him literally with
open arms, while even the dogs finally came to tolerate
him. He grew apace, and was a quaint and on the whole
a friendly — though occasionally short-tempered — pet.
He played tag with us with inexhaustible energy, looking
much like a small mattress with a leg at each corner; he
dug holes with marvellous rapidity; and when he grew
snappish we lifted him up by the back of the neck, which
rendered him harmless. He ate bread and milk, dead
mice and birds, and eggs; he would take a hen's egg in
his mouth, break it, and avoid spilling any of the contents.
When angered, he hissed, and at other times he made low
guttural sounds. The nine-year-old boy became his espe-
cial friend. Now and then he nipped the little boy's
legs, but this never seemed to interrupt the amicable rela-
tions between the two; as the little boy normally wore
neither shoes nor stockings, and his blue overalls were
thin, Josiah probably found the temptation at times irre-
sistible. If on such occasions the boy was in Josiah's
wire-fenced enclosure, he sat on a box with his legs tucked
under him; if the play was taking place outside, he
usually climbed into the hammock, while Josiah pranced
and capered clumsily beneath, tail up and head thrown
back. But Josiah never bit when picked up ; although
354 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
he hissed like a teakettle as the little boy carried him
about, usually tightly clasped round where his waist
would have been if he had had one.
At different times I have been given a fairly appalling
number of animals, from known and unknown friends; in
one year the list included — besides a lion, a hyena, and a
zebra from the Emperor of Ethiopia — five bears, a wild-
cat, a coyote, two macaws, an eagle, a barn owl, and sev-
eral snakes and lizards. Most of these went to the Zoo,
but a few were kept by the children. Those thus kept
numbered at one end of the scale gentle, trustful, pretty
things, like kangaroo rats and flying squirrels; and at the
other end a queer-tempered young black bear, which the
children named Jonathan Edwards, partly because of cer-
tain well-marked Calvinistic tendencies in his disposition,
partly out of compliment to their mother, whose ances-
tors included that Puritan divine. The kangaroo rats and
flying squirrels slept in their pockets and blouses, went to
school with them, and sometimes unexpectedly appeared
at breakfast or dinner. The bear added zest to life in
more ways than one. When we took him to walk, it was
always with a chain and club ; and when at last he went
to the Zoo, the entire household breathed a sigh of relief,
although I think the dogs missed him, as he had occa-
sionally yielded them the pleasure of the chase in its
strongest form.
As a steady thing, the children found rabbits and
guinea pigs the most satisfactory pets. The guinea pigs
usually rejoiced in the names of the local or national
celebrities of the moment; at one time there were five,
JOSIAH
AT HOME 355
which were named after naval heroes and friendly ecclesi-
astical dignitaries — an Episcopalian Bishop, a Catholic
Priest, and my own Dutch Reformed Pastor — Bishop
Doane, Father O'Grady, Dr. Johnson, Fighting Bob
Evans, and Admiral Dewey. Father O'Grady, by the
way, proved to be of the softer sex; a fact definitely estab-
lished when two of his joint owners, rushing breathless
into the room, announced to a mixed company, " Oh, oh,
Father O'Grady has had some children! "
Of course there are no pets like horses; and horse-
manship is a test of prowess. The best among vigorous
out-of-door sports should be more than pastimes. Play
is good for play's sake, within moderate limits, especially
if it is athletic play; and, again within moderate limits,
it is good because a healthy body helps toward healthi-
ness of mind. But if play serves only either of these
ends, it does not deserve the serious consideration which
rightly attaches to play which in itself fits a man to do
things worth doing; and there exists no creature much
more contemptible than a man past his first youth who
leads a life devoted to mere sport, without thought of the
serious work of life. In a free Government the average
citizen should be able to do his duty in war as well as in
peace; otherwise he falls short. Cavalrymen and infan-
trymen, who do not need special technical knowledge, arc
easily developed out of men who are already soldiers in
the rough, that is, who, in addition to the essential quali-
ties of manliness and character, the qualities of resolution,
daring and intelligence, which go to make up the " fight-
ing edge," also possess physical hardihood; who can live
356 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
in the open, walk long distances, ride, shoot, and endure
fatigue, hardship, and exposure. But if all these traits
must be painfully acquired, then it takes a long time in-
deed before the man can be turned into a good soldier.
Now, there is little tendency to develop these traits in our
highly complex, rather over-civilized, modern industrial
life, and therefore the sports which produce them serve
a useful purpose. Hence, when able to afiford a horse,
or to practise on a rifle range, one can feel that the enjoy-
ment is warranted by what may be called considerations
of national ethics.
As with everything else, so with riding; some take to
it naturally, others never can become even fairly good
horsemen. All the children ride, with varying skill.
While young, a Shetland pony serves; the present pony,
Algonquin, a calico or pinto, being as knowing and
friendly as possible. His first small owner simply adored
him, treating him as a twin brother, and having implicit
faith in his mental powers. On one occasion, when a
naval officer of whom the children were fond came to
call, in full dress, Algonquin's master, who was much
impressed by the sight, led up Algonquin to enjoy it too,
and was shocked by the entire indifference with which the
greedy pony persisted in eating grass. One favorite polo
pony, old Diamond, long after he became a pensioner,
served for whichever child had just graduated from the
sheltie. Next in order was a little mare named Yagenka,
after the heroine of one of Sienkewicz's blood-curdling
romances of mediaeval Poland. When every rideable
animal is impressed, all the children sometimes go out
BLEISTEIN JUMPING
From a photograpli, copyright, 1002, by Clinedinst, Washington, D. C.
AT HOME 357
with their mother and me; looking much like the Cum-
berbatch family in Caldecott's pictures.
Of recent years I have not been able to ride to hounds ;
but when opportunity has offered I have kept as saddle
horses one or two hunters, so that instead of riding the
road I could strike oflf across country; the hunter scram-
bling handily through rough places, and jumping an oc-
casional fence if necessary. While in Washington this
is often, except for an occasional long walk down Rock
Creek or along the Virginia side of the Potomac, the
only exercise I can get. Among the various horses I have
owned in recent years Bleistein was the one I liked best,
because of his good nature and courage. He was a fair,
although in no way a remarkable, jumper. One day,
May 3, 1902, I took him out to Chevy Chase and had
him photographed while jumping various fences and
brush hurdles; the accompanying picture is from one of
these photos. Another hunter. Renown, was a much
higher, but an uncertain, jumper. He was a beau-
tiful horse, and very good-tempered, but excessively
timid.
We have been able to fix a rifle range at Sagamore,
though only up to 200 yards. Some of the children take
to shooting naturally, others can only with difficulty be
made to learn the rudiments of what they regard as a
tiresome business. Many friends have shot on this range.
We use only sporting rifles; my own is one of the new
model Government Springfields, stocked and sighted to
suit myself. For American game the modern small cali-
bre, high power, smokeless powder rifle, of any one
358 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
among several makes, is superseding the others ; although
for some purposes an old 45-70 or 45-90, even with black
powder, is as good as any modern weapon, and for very
heavy game the calibre should be larger than that of the
typical modern arm, with a heavier ball and more
powder. But after all, any good modern rifle is good
enough; when a certain pitch of excellence in the weapon
has been attained, then the determining factor in achiev-
ing success is the quality of the man behind the gun.
My eldest boy killed his first buck just before he was
fourteen, and his first moose — a big bull with horns
which spread 56 inches — just before he was seventeen.
Both were killed in the wilderness, in the great north
woods, on trips sufficiently hard to afford some test of
endurance and skill. Such a hunting trip is even more
than a delightful holiday, provided the work is hard as
well as enjoyable; and therefore it must be taken in the
wilderness. Big private preserves may serve a useful
purpose if managed with such judgment and kindliness
that the good will of the neighborhood is secured; but
the sport in them somehow seems to have lost its savor,
even though they may be large enough to give the chance
of testing a man's woodcraft no less than his marksman-
ship. I have but once hunted in one of them. That
was in the fall of 1902, when Senator Proctor took me
into the Corbin Park game preserve in New Hampshire.
The Senator is not merely a good shot; he is a good
hunter, with the eye, the knowledge of the game, and the
ability to take advantage of cover and walk silently,
which are even more important than straight powder.
AT HOME 359
He took me out alone for the afternoon, and, besides the
tame buffalo, he showed me one elk and over twenty deer.
We were only after the wild boar, which have flourished
wonderfully. Just at dusk we saw a three-year-old boar
making his way toward an old deserted orchard; and
creeping up, I shot him as he munched apples under one
of the trees.
CHAPTER XII
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES
In October, 1907, I spent a fortnight in the cane-
brakes of northern Louisiana, my hosts being Messrs.
John M. Parker and John A. Mcllhenny. Surgeon-
General Rixey, of the United States Navy, and Dr. Alex-
ander Lambert were with me. I was especially anxious
to kill a bear in these canebrakes after the fashion of the
old Southern planters, who for a century past have fol-
lowed the bear with horse, hound and horn in Louisiana,
Mississippi and Arkansas.
Our first camp was on Tensas Bayou. This is in the
heart of the great alluvial bottom-land created during
the countless ages through which the mighty Mississippi
has poured out of the heart of the continent. It is in the
black belt of the South, in which the negroes outnumber
the whites four or five to one, the disproportion in the
region in which I was actually hunting being far greater.
There is no richer soil in all the earth ; and when, as will
soon be the case, the chances of disaster from flood are
over, I believe the whole land will be cultivated and
densely peopled. At present the possibility of such flood
is a terrible deterrent to settlement, for when the Father
of Waters breaks his boundaries he turns the country
for a breadth of eighty miles into one broad river, the
plantations throughout all this vast extent being from
360
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 361
five to twenty feet under water. Cotton is the staple
industry, corn also being grown, while there are a few
rice fields and occasional small patches of sugar cane.
The plantations are for the most part of large size and
tilled by negro tenants for the white owners. Condi-
tions are still in some respects like those of the pioneer
days. The magnificent forest growth which covers the
land is of little value because of the difficulty in getting
the trees to market, and the land is actually worth more
after the timber has been removed than before. In con-
sequence, the larger trees are often killed by girdling,
where the work of felling them would entail dispropor-
tionate cost and labor. At dusk, with the sunset glimmer-
ing in the west, or in the brilliant moonlight wiien the
moon is full, the cotton fields have a strange spectral look,
with the dead trees raising aloft their naked branches.
The cotton fields themselves, when the bolls burst open,
seem almost as if whitened by snow; and the red and
white flowers, interspersed among the burst-open pods,
make the whole field beautiful. The rambling one-story
houses, surrounded by outbuildings, have a picturesque-
ness all their own; their very looks betoken the lavish,
whole-hearted, generous hospitality of the planters who
dwell therein.
Beyond the end of cultivation towers the great forest.
Wherever the water stands in pools, and by the edges of
the lakes and bayous, the giant cypress looms aloft,
rivalled in size by some of the red gums and white oaks.
In stature, in towering majesty, they are unsurpassed by
any trees of our eastern forests; lordlier kings of the
362 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
green-leaved world are not to be found until we reach
the sequoias and red-woods of the Sierras. Among them
grow many other trees — hackberry, thorn, honey locust,
tupelo, pecan and ash. In the cypress sloughs the singu-
lar knees of the trees stand two or three feet above the
black ooze. Palmettos grow thickly in places. The cane-
brakes stretch along the slight rises of ground, often ex-
tending for miles, forming one of the most striking and
interesting features of the country. They choke out other
growth, the feathery, graceful canes standing tall, slen-
der, serried, each but a few inches from his brother, and
springing to a height of fifteen or twenty feet. They look
like bamboos; they are well-nigh impenetrable for a man
on horseback; even on foot they make difficult walking
unless free use is made of the heavy bushknife. It is im-
possible to see through them for more than fifteen or
twenty paces, and often for not half that distance. Bears
make their lairs in them, and they are the refuge for
hunted things. Outside of them, in the swamp, bushes
of many kinds grow thick among the tall trees, and vines
and creepers climb the trunks and hang in trailing fes-
toons from the branches. Here likewise the bushknife
is in constant play, as the skilled horsemen thread their
way, often at a gallop, in and out among the great tree
trunks, and through the dense, tangled, thorny under-
growth.
In the lakes and larger bayous we saw alligators and
garfish; and monstrous snapping turtles, fearsome brutes
of the slime, as heavy as a man, and with huge horny
beaks that with a single snap could take off a man's hand
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 363
or foot. One of the planters with us had lost part of his
hand by the bite of an alligator; and had seen a compan-
ion seized by the foot by a huge garfish from which he
was rescued with the utmost difficulty by his fellow-
swimmers. There were black bass in the waters too, and
they gave us many a good meal. Thick-bodied water
moccasins, foul and dangerous, kept near the water; and
farther back in the swamp we found and killed rattle-
snakes and copperheads.
Coon and possum were very plentiful, and in the
streams there were minks and a few otters. Black squir-
rels barked in the tops of the tall trees or descended to the
ground to gather nuts or gnaw the shed deer antlers — the
latter a habit they shared with the wood rats. To me the
most interesting of the smaller mammals, however, were
the swamp rabbits, which are thoroughly amphibious in
their habits, not only swimming but diving, and taking
to the water almost as freely as if they were muskrats.
They lived in the depths of the woods and beside the
lonely bayous.
Birds were plentiful. Mocking birds abounded in
the clearings, where, among many sparrows of more com-
mon kind, I saw the painted finch, the gaudily colored
brother of our little indigo bunting, though at this season
his plumage was faded and dim. In the thick woods
where we hunted there were many cardinal birds and
Carolina wrens, both in full song. Thrashers were even
more common; but so cautious that it was rather difficult
to see them, in spite of their incessant clucking and call-
ing and their occasional bursts of song. There were
364 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
crowds of warblers and vireos of many different kinds,
evidently migrants from the north, and generally silent.
The most characteristic birds, however, were the wood-
peckers, of which there were seven or eight species, the
commonest around our camp being the handsome red-
bellied, the brother of the red-head which we saw in the
clearings. The most notable birds and those which most
interested me were the great ivory-billed woodpeckers.
Of these I saw three, all of them in groves of giant
cypress; their brilliant white bills contrasted finely with
the black of their general plumage. They were noisy
but wary, and they seemed to me to set off the wildness of
the swamp as much as any of the beasts of the chase.
Among the birds of prey the commonest were the barred
owls, which I have never elsewhere seen so plentiful.
Their hooting and yelling were heard all around us
throughout the night, and once one of them hooted at
intervals for several minutes at midday. One of these
owls had caught and was devouring a snake in the late
afternoon, while it was still daylight. In the dark nights
and still mornings and evenings their cries seemed strange
and unearthly, the long hoots varied by screeches, and
by all kinds of uncanny noises.
At our first camp our tents were pitched by the bayou.
For four days the weather was hot, with steaming rains;
after that it grew cool and clear. Huge biting flies,
bigger than bees, attacked our horses; but the insect
plagues, so veritable a scourge in this country during the
months of warm weather, had well-nigh vanished in the
first few weeks of the fall.
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 365
The morning after we reached camp we were joined
by Ben Lilley, the hunter, a spare, full-bearded man, with
wild, gentle, blue eyes and a frame of steel and whipcord.
I never met any other man so indifferent to fatigue and
hardship. He equalled Cooper's Deerslayer in wood-
craft, in hardihood, in simplicity — and also in loquacity.
The morning he joined us in camp, he had come on foot
through the thick woods, followed by his two dogs, and
had neither eaten nor drunk for twenty-four hours; for
he did not like to drink the swamp water. It had rained
hard throughout the night and he had no shelter, no
rubber coat, nothing but the clothes he was wearing, and
the ground was too wet for him to lie on; so he perched
in a crooked tree in the beating rain, much as if he had
been a wild turkey. But he was not in the least tired
when he struck camp; and, though he slept an hour after
breakfast, it was chiefly because he had nothing else to
do, inasmuch as it was Sunday, on which day he never
hunted nor labored. He could run through the woods
like a buck, was far more enduring, and quite as indif-
ferent to weather, though he was over fifty years old.
He had trapped and hunted throughout almost all the
half century of his life, and on trail of game he was as
sure as his own hounds. His observations on wild crea-
tures were singularly close and accurate. He was par-
ticularly fond of the chase of the bear, which he followed
by himself, with one or two dogs; often he would be
on the trail of his quarry for days at a time, lying down
to sleep wherever night overtook him, and he had killed
over a hundred and twenty bears.
366 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
Late in the evening of the same day we were joined
by two gentlemen to whom we owed the success of our
hunt: Messrs. Clive and Harley Metcalf, planters from
Mississippi, men in the prime of life, thorough woods-
men and hunters, skilled marksmen, and utterly fearless
horsemen. For a quarter of a century they had hunted
bear and deer with horse and hound, and were masters
of the art. They brought with them their pack of bear
hounds, only one, however, being a thoroughly staunch
and seasoned veteran. The pack was under the imme-
diate control of a negro hunter. Holt Collier, in his own
way as remarkable a character as Ben Lilley. He was a
man of sixty and could neither read nor write, but he
had all the dignity of an African chief, and for half a
century he had been a bear hunter, having killed or as-
sisted in killing over three thousand bears. He had been
born a slave on the Hinds plantation, his father, an old
man when he was born, having been the body servant and
cook of " old General Hinds," as he called him, when the
latter fought under Jackson at New Orleans. When ten
years old Holt had been taken on the horse behind his
young master, the Hinds of that day, on a bear hunt,
when he killed his first bear. In the Civil War he had
not only followed his master to battle as his body servant,
but had acted under him as sharpshooter against the
Union soldiers. After the war he continued to stay with
his master until the latter died, and had then been adopted
by the Metcalfs; and he felt that he had brought them
up, and treated them with that mixture of affection and
grumbling respect which an old nurse shows toward the
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 367
lad who has ceased being a child. The two Metcalfs
and Holt understood one another thoroughly, and under-
stood their hounds and the game their hounds followed
almost as thoroughly.
They had killed many deer and wildcat, and now and
then a panther; but their favorite game was the black
bear, which, until within a very few years, was extraordi-
narily plentiful in the swamps and canebrakes on both
sides of the lower Mississippi, and which is still found
here and there, although in greatly diminished numbers.
In Louisiana and Mississippi the bears go into their dens
toward the end of January, usually in hollow trees, often
very high up in living trees, but often also in great logs
that lie rotting on the ground. They come forth toward
the end of April, the cubs having been born in the inter-
val. At this time the bears are nearly as fat, so my in-
formants said, as when they enter their dens in January;
but they lose their fat very rapidly. On first coming out
in the spring they usually eat ash buds and the tender
young cane called mutton cane, and at that season they
generally refuse to eat the acorns even when they are
plentiful. According to my informants it is at this sea-
son that they are most apt to take to killing stock, almost
always the hogs which run wild or semi-wild in the
woods. They are very individual in their habits, how-
ever; many of them never touch stock, while others, usu-
ally old he-bears, may kill numbers of hogs; in one case
an old he-bear began this hog-killing just as soon as he
left his den. In the summer months they find but little
to eat, and it is at this season that they are most industrious
368 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
in hunting for grubs, insects, frogs and small mammals.
In some neighborhoods they do not eat fish, while in other
places, perhaps not far away, they not only greedily eat
dead fish, but will themselves kill fish if they can find
them in shallow pools left by the receding waters. As
soon as the mast is on the ground they begin to feed upon
it, and when the acorns and pecans are plentiful they eat
nothing else; though at first berries of all kinds and
grapes are eaten also. When in November they have
begun only to eat the acorns they put on fat as no other
wild animal does, and by the end of December a full-
grown bear may weigh at least twice as much as it does
in August, the difference being as great as between a very
fat and a lean hog. Old he-bears which in August weigh
three hundred pounds and upward will, toward the end
of December, weigh six hundred pounds, and even more
in exceptional cases.
Bears vary greatly in their habits in different local-
ities, in addition to the individual variation among those
of the same neighborhood. Around Avery Island, John
Mcllhenny's plantation, the bears only appear from June
to November; there they never kill hogs, but feed at first
on corn and then on sugar cane, doing immense damage
in the fields, quite as much as hogs would do. But when
we were on the Tensas we visited a family of settlers who
lived right in the midst of the forest ten miles from any
neighbors ; and although bears were plentiful around
them they never molested their corn fields — in which the
coons, however, did great damage.
A big bear is cunning, and is a dangerous fighter to
I
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 369
the dogs. It is only in exceptional cases, however, that
these black bears, even when wounded and at bay, are
dangerous to men, in spite of their formidable strength.
Each of the hunters with whom I was camped had been
charged by one or two among the scores or hundreds of
bears he had slain, but no one of them had ever been in-
jured, although they knew other men who had been in-
jured. Their immunity was due to their own skill and
coolness; for when the dogs were around the bear the
hunter invariably ran close in so as to kill the bear at once
and save the pack. Each of the Metcalfs had on one
occasion killed a large bear with a knife, when the hounds
had seized it and the men dared not fire for fear of shoot-
ing one of them. They had in their younger days hunted
with a General Hamberlin, a Mississippi planter whom
they well knew, who was then already an old man. He
was passionately addicted to the chase of the bear, not
only because of the sport it afforded, but also in a certain
way as a matter of vengeance; for his father, also a keen
bear-hunter, had been killed by a bear. It was an old he,
which he had wounded and which had been bayed by the
dogs; it attacked him, throwing him down and biting
him so severely that he died a couple of days later. This
was in 1847. Mr. W. H. Lambeth sends the following
account of the fatal encounter:
" I send you an extract from the Brother Jonathan,
published in New York in 1847 :
" ' Dr. Monroe Hamberlin, Robert Wilson, Joe Brazeil,
and others left Satartia, Miss., and in going up Big Sun-
370
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
flower River, met Mr. Leiser and his party of hunters return-
ing to Vicksburg. Mr. Leiser told Dr. Hamberlin that he
saw the largest bear track at the big Mound on Lake George
that he ever saw, and was afraid to tackle him. Dr. Ham-
berlin said, " I never saw one that I was afraid to tackle." Dr.
Hamberlin landed his skiff at the Mound and his dogs soon
bayed the bear. Dr. Hamberlin fired and the ball glanced on
the bear's head. The bear caught him by the right thigh and
tore all the flesh off. He drew his knife and the bear crushed
his right arm. He cheered the dogs and they pulled the bear
off. The bear whipped the dogs and attacked him the third
time, biting him in the hollow back of his neck. Mr. Wilson
came up and shot the bear dead on Dr. Hamberlin. The party
returned to Satartia, but Dr. Hamberlin told them to put the
bear in the skiff, that he would not leave without his antagonist.
The bear weighed 640 pounds.'
" Dr. Hamberlin lived three days, I knew all the parties.
His son John and myself hunted with them in 1843 ^^^ 1844,
when we were too small to carry a gun."
A large bear is not afraid of dogs, and an old he,
or a she with cubs, is alw^ays on the lookout for a chance
to catch and kill any dog that comes near enough. While
lean and in good running condition it is not an easy mat-
ter to bring a bear to bay; but as they grow fat they be-
come steadily less able to run, and the young ones, and
even occasionally a full-grown she, will then readily tree.
If a man is not near by, a big bear that has become tired
will treat the pack with whimsical indifference. The
Metcalfs recounted to me how they had once seen a bear,
which had been chased quite a time, evidently make up
its mind that it needed a rest and could afiford to take it
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 371
without much regard for the hounds. The bear accord-
ingly selected a small opening and lay flat on its back with
its nose and all its four legs extended. The dogs sur-
rounded it in frantic excitement, barking and baying, and
gradually coming in a ring very close up. The bear was
watching, however, and suddenly sat up with a jerk,
frightening the dogs nearly into fits. Half of them turned
back somersaults in their panic, and all promptly gave
the bear ample room. The bear having looked about, lay
flat on its back again, and the pack gradually regaining
courage once more closed in. At first the bear, which
was evidently reluctant to arise, kept them at a distance
by now and then thrusting an unexpected paw toward
them; and when they became too bold it sat up with a
jump and once more put them all to flight.
For several days we hunted perseveringly around this
camp on the Tensas Bayou, but without success. Deer
abounded, but we could find no bears ; and of the deer we
killed only what we actually needed for use in camp. I
killed one myself by a good shot, in which, however, I
fear that the element of luck played a considerable part.
We had started as usual by sunrise, to be gone all day;
for we never counted upon returning to camp before
sunset. For an hour or two we threaded our way, first
along an indistinct trail, and then on an old disused road,
the hardy woods-horses keeping on a running walk with-
out much regard to the difficulties of the ground. The
disused road lay right across a great canebrake, and while
some of the party went around the cane with the dogs, the
rest of us strung out along the road so as to get a shot
372
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
at any bear that might come across it. I was following
Harley Metcalf, with John Mcllhenny and Dr. Rixey
behind on the way to their posts, when we heard in the
far-off distance two of the younger hounds, evidently on
the trail of a deer. Almost immediately afterward a
crash in the bushes at our right hand and behind us made
me turn around, and I saw a deer running across the few
feet of open space; and as I leaped from my horse it dis-
appeared in the cane. I am a rather deliberate shot, and
under any circumstances a rifle is not the best weapon
for snap shooting, while there is no kind of shooting more
difficult than on running game in a canebrake. Luck
favored me in this instance, however, for there was a spot
a little ahead of where the deer entered in which the cane
was thinner, and I kept my rifle on its indistinct, shadowy
outline until it reached this spot; it then ran quartering
away from me, which made my shot much easier, although
I could only catch its general outline through the cane.
But the 45-70 which I was using is a powerful gun and
shoots right through cane or bushes; and as soon as I
pulled trigger the deer, with a bleat, turned a tremen-
dous somersault and was dead when we reached it. I
was not a little pleased that my bullet should have
sped so true when I was making my first shot in com-
pany with my hard-riding, straight-shooting planter
friends.
But no bears were to be found. We waited long hours
on likely stands. We rode around the canebrakes
through the swampy jungle, or threaded our way across
them on trails cut by the heavy wood-knives of my com-
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 373
panions; but we found nothing. Until the trails were
cut the canebrakes were impenetrable to a horse and were
difficult enough to a man on foot. On going through
them it seemed as if we must be in the tropics ; the silence,
the stillness, the heat, and the obscurity, all combining to
give a certain eeriness to the task, as we chopped our
winding way slowly through the dense mass of close-
growing, feather-fronded stalks. Each of the hunters
prided himself on his skill with the horn, which was an
essential adjunct of the hunt, used both to summon and
control the hounds, and for signalling among the hunters
themselves. The tones of many of the horns were full
and musical; and it was pleasant to hear them as they
wailed to one another, backward and forward, across the
great stretches of lonely swamp and forest.
A few days convinced us that it was a waste of time
to stay longer where we were. Accordingly, early one
morning we hunters started for a new camp fifteen or
twenty miles to the southward, on Bear Lake. We took
the hounds with us, and each man carried what he chose
or could in his saddle-pockets, while his slicker was on
his horse's back behind him. Otherwise we took abso-
lutely nothing in the way of supplies, and the negroes
with the tents and camp equipage were three days before
they overtook us. On our way down we were joined by
Major Amacker and Dr. Miller, with a small pack of cat
hounds. These were good deer dogs, and they ran down
and killed on the ground a good-sized bobcat — a wildcat,
as it is called in the South. It was a male and weighed
twenty-three and a half pounds. It had just killed and
374
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
eaten a large rabbit. The stomachs of the deer we killed,
by the way, contained acorns and leaves.
Our new camp was beautifully situated on the bold,
steep bank of Bear Lake — a tranquil stretch of water,
part of an old river bed, a couple of hundred yards broad
with a winding length of several miles. Giant cypress
grew at the edge of the water; the singular cypress knees
rising in every direction round about, while at the bot-
toms of the trunks themselves were often cavernous hol-
lows opening beneath the surface of water, some of them
serving as dens for alligators. There was a waxing moon,
so that the nights were as beautiful as the days.
From our new camp we hunted as steadily as from the
old. We saw bear sign, but not much of it, and only one
or two fresh tracks. One day the hounds jumped a bear,
probably a yearling from the way it ran; for at this sea-
son a yearling or a two-year-old will run almost like a
deer, keeping to the thick cane as long as it can and then
bolting across through the bushes of the ordinary swamp
land until it can reach another canebrake. After a three
hours' run this particular animal managed to get clear
away without one of the hunters ever seeing it, and it ran
until all the dogs were tired out. A day or two afterward
one of the other members of the party shot a small year-
ling — that is, a bear which would have been two years old
in the following February. It was very lean, weighing
but fifty-five pounds. The finely chewed acorns in its
stomach showed that it was already beginning to find
mast.
We had seen the tracks of an old she in the neigh-
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 375
borhood, and the next morning we started to hunt her out.
I went with Clive Metcalf. We had been joined over-
night by Mr. Ichabod Osborn and his son Tom, two
Louisiana planters, with six or eight hounds — or rather
bear dogs, for in these packs most of the animals are of
mixed blood, and, as with all packs that are used in the
genuine hunting of the wilderness, pedigree counts for
nothing as compared with steadiness, courage and intelli-
gence. There were only two of the new dogs that were
really staunch bear dogs. The father of Ichabod Osborn
had taken up the plantation upon which they were living
in 181 1, only a few years after Louisiana became part of
the United States, and young Osborn was now the third
in line from father to son who had steadily hunted bears
in this immediate neighborhood.
On reaching the cypress slough near which the tracks
of the old she had been seen the day before, Clive Met-
calf and I separated from the others and rode off at a
lively pace between two of the canebrakes. After an hour
or two's wait we heard, very far off, the notes of one
of the loudest-mouthed hounds, and instantly rode
toward it, until we could make out the babel of the pack.
Some hard galloping brought us opposite the point
toward which they were heading, — for experienced hunt-
ers can often tell the probable line of a bear's flight, and
the spots at which it will break cover. But on this occa-
sion the bear shied off from leaving the thick cane and
doubled back; and soon the hounds were once more out
of hearing, while we galloped desperately around the
edge of the cane. The tough woods-horses kept their
376 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
feet like cats as they leaped logs, plunged through bushes,
and dodged in and out among the tree trunks ; and we had
all we could do to prevent the vines from lifting us out
of the saddle, while the thorns tore our hands and faces.
Hither and thither we went, now at a trot, now at a run,
now stopping to listen for the pack. Occasionally we
could hear the hounds, and then off we would go racing
through the forest toward the point toward which we
thought they were heading. Finally, after a couple of
hours of this, we came up on one side of a canebrake on
the other side of which we could hear, not only the pack,
but the yelling and cheering of Harley Metcalf and Tom
Osborn and one or two of the negro hunters, all of whom
were trying to keep the dogs up to their work in the thick
cane. Again we rode ahead, and now in a few minutes
were rewarded by hearing the leading dogs come to bay
in the thickest of the cover. Having galloped as near to
the spot as we could we threw ourselves off the horses and
plunged into the cane, trying to cause as little disturbance
as possible, but of course utterly unable to avoid making
some noise. Before we were within gunshot, however,
we could tell by the sounds that the bear had once again
started, making what is called a " walking bay." Clive
Metcalf, a finished bear-hunter, was speedily able to de-
termine what the bear's probable course would be, and
we stole through the cane until we came to a spot near
which he thought the quarry would pass. Then we
crouched down, I with my rifle at the ready. Nor did
we have long to wait. Peering through the thick-grow-
ing stalks I suddenly made out the dim outline of the
LISTENING FOR THE PACK
From a photograph, copyright, 1907, by Alexander Lambert, M.D.
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES
377
bear coming straight toward us ; and noiselessly I cocked
and half-raised my rifle, waiting for a clearer chance. In
a few seconds it came; the bear turned almost broad-
side to me, and walked forward very stiff-legged, al-
most as if on tiptoe, now and then looking back at
the nearest dogs. These were two in number — Rowdy,
a very deep-voiced hound, in the lead, and Queen, a
shrill-tongued brindled bitch, a little behind. Once or
twice the bear paused as she looked back at them, evi-
dently hoping that they would come so near that by a
sudden race she could catch one of them. But they were
too wary.
All of this took but a few moments, and as I saw the
bear quite distinctly some twenty yards off, I fired for
behind the shoulder. Although I could see her outline,
yet the cane was so thick that my sight was on it and not
on the bear itself. But I knew my bullet would go true;
and sure enough, at the crack of the rifle the bear stum-
bled and fell forward, the bullet having passed through
both lungs and out at the opposite side. Immediately the
dogs came running forward at full speed, and we raced
forward likewise lest the pack should receive damage.
The bear had but a minute or two to live, yet even in
that time more than one valuable hound might lose its
life; when within half a dozen steps of the black, an-
gered beast, I fired again, breaking the spine at the root
of the neck; and down went the bear stark dead, slain
in the canebrake in true hunter fashion. One by one the
hounds struggled up and fell on their dead quarry, the
noise of the worry filling the air. Then we dragged
378 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
the bear out to the edge of the cane, and my companion
wound his horn to summon the other hunters.
This was a big she-bear, very lean, and weighing two
hundred and two pounds. In her stomach were pal-
metto berries, beetles and a little mutton cane, but chiefly
acorns chewed up in a fine brown mass.
John Mcllhenny had killed a she-bear about the size
of this on his plantation at Avery's Island the previous
June. Several bears had been raiding his corn fields and
one evening he determined to try to waylay them. After
dinner he left the ladies of his party on the gallery of his
house while he rode down in a hollow and concealed him-
self on the lower side of the corn field. Before he had
waited ten minutes a she-bear and her cub came into the
field. Then she rose on her hind legs, tearing down an
armful of ears of corn which she seemingly gave to the
cub, and then rose for another armful. Mcllhenny shot
her; tried in vain to catch the cub; and rejoined the party
on the veranda, having been absent but one hour.
After the death of my bear I had only a couple of
days left. We spent them a long distance from camp,
having to cross two bayous before we got to the hunting
grounds. I missed a shot at a deer, seeing little more than
the flicker of its white tail through the dense bushes;
and the pack caught and killed a very lean two-year-old
bear weighing eighty pounds. Near a beautiful pond
called Panther Lake we found a deer-lick, the ground not
merely bare but furrowed into hollows by the tongues of
the countless generations of deer that had frequented
the place. We also passed a huge mound, the only hillock
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 379
in the entire district; it was the work of man, for it had
been built in the unknown past by those unknown peo-
ple whom we call moundbuilders. On the trip, all told,
we killed and brought into camp three bears, six deer, a
wildcat, a turkey, a possum, and a dozen squirrels; and
we ate everything except the wildcat.
In the evenings we sat around the blazing campfires,
and, as always on such occasions, each hunter told tales
of his adventures and of the strange feats and habits of
the beasts of the wilderness. There had been beaver all
through this delta in the old days, and a very few are still
left in out-of-the-way places. One Sunday morning we
saw two wolves, I think young of the year, appear for a
moment on the opposite side of the bayou, but they van-
ished before we could shoot. All of our party had had a
good deal of experience with wolves. The Metcalfs had
had many sheep killed by them, the method of killing
being invariably by a single bite which tore open the
throat while the wolf ran beside his victim. The wolves
also killed young hogs, but were very cautious about med-
dling with an old sow; while one of the big half-wild
boars that ranged free through the woods had no fear of
any number of wolves. Their endurance and the ex-
tremely difficult nature of the country made it difficult to
hunt them, and the hunters all bore them a grudge, be-
cause if a hound got lost in a region where wolves were
at all plentiful they were almost sure to find and kill him
before he got home. They were fond of preying on dogs,
and at times would boldly kill the hounds right ahead of
the hunters. In one instance, while the dogs were fol-
380 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
lowing a bear and were but a couple of hundred yards
in front of the horsemen, a small party of wolves got in
on them and killed two. One of the Osborns, having a
valuable hound which was addicted to wandering in the
woods, saved him from the wolves by putting a bell
on him. The wolves evidently suspected a trap and
would never go near the dog. On one occasion another
of his hounds got loose with a chain on, and they found
him a day or two afterward unharmed, his chain having
become entangled in the branches of a bush. One or
two wolves had evidently walked around and around the
imprisoned dog, but the chain had awakened their sus-
picions and they had not pounced on him. They had
killed a yearling heifer a short time before, on Osborn's
plantation, biting her in the hams. It has been my ex-
perience that fox hounds as a rule are afraid of attack-
ing a wolf; but all of my friends assured me that their
dogs, if a sufficient number of them were together, would
tackle a wolf without hesitation ; the packs, however, were
always composed, to the extent of at least half, of dogs
which, though part hound, were part shepherd or bull
or some other breed. Dr. Miller had hunted in Arkan-
sas with a pack specially trained after the wolf. There
were twenty-eight of them all told, and on this hunt they
ran down and killed unassisted four full-grown wolves,
although some of the hounds were badly cut. None of
my companions had ever known of wolves actually
molesting men, but Mr. Ichabod Osborn's son-in-law
had a queer adventure with wolves while riding alone
through the woods one late afternoon. His horse acting
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 381
nervously, he looked about and saw that five wolves were
coming toward him. One was a bitch, the other four
were males. They seemed to pay little heed to him, and
he shot one of the males, which crawled off. The next
minute the bitch ran straight toward him and was almost
at his stirrup when he killed her. The other three wolves,
instead of running away, jumped to and fro growling,
with their hair bristling, and he killed two of them;
whereupon the survivor at last made off. He brought
the scalps of the three dead wolves home with him.
Near our first camp was the carcass of a deer, a
yearling buck, which had been killed by a cougar. When
first found, the wounds on the carcass showed that the
deer had been killed by a bite in the neck at the back
of the head; but there were scratches on the rump as if
the panther had landed on its back. One of the negro
hunters, Brutus Jackson, evidently a trustworthy man,
told me that he had twice seen cougars, each time under
unexpected conditions. Once he saw a bobcat race up a
tree, and riding toward it saw a panther reared up
against the trunk. The panther looked around at him
quite calmly, and then retired in leisurely fashion. Jack-
son went off to get some hounds, and when he returned
two hours afterward the bobcat was still up the tree,
evidently so badly scared that he did not wish to come
down. The hounds were unable to follow the cougar.
On another occasion he heard a tremendous scuffle and
immediately afterward saw a big doe racing along with
a small cougar literally riding it. The cougar was bit-
ing the neck, but low down near the shoulders; he was
382 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
hanging on with his front paws, but was tearing away
with his hind claws so that the deer's hair appeared to
fill the air. As soon as Jackson appeared the panther
left the deer. He shot it, and the doe galloped off,
apparently without serious injury.
I wish those who see cougars kill game, or who come
on game that they have killed, would study and record
the exact method employed in killing. Mr. Hornaday
sent me a photograph of a cougar killing a goat, which
he had seized high up on the back of the neck in his
jaws, not using his claws at all. I once found where one
had killed a big buck by seizing him by the throat; the
claws also having evidently been used to hold the buck
in the struggle. Another time I found a colt which had
been killed by a bite in the neck; and yet another time a
young doe which had been killed by a bite in the head.
In most cases where I came across the carcasses of deer
which had been killed by cougars they had been partially
eaten, and it was not possible to find out exactly how
they had been slain. In one instance at least the neck
had been broken, evidently in the struggle; but I could
not tell whether this had been done designedly, by the
use of the forepaws. Twice hunters I have known saw
cougars seize mountain sheep, in each case by the throat.
The information furnished me inclines me to believe that
most game is killed by cougars in this fashion. Most of
the carcasses of elk which had been killed by cougars
that I have examined showed fang marks round the
throat and neck; but one certainly did not, though it is
possible in this case that the elk died in some other way.
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 383
and that the cougar had merely been feeding on its dead
body. But I have read of cases in which elk and large
deer were slain where the carcasses were said to have
shown wounds only on the flanks, and where the writers
believed — with how much justification I cannot say —
that the wounds had been inflicted by the claws. I should
be surprised to find that such was the ordinary method
with cougars of killing game of any kind; but it is per-
haps unsafe to deny the possibility of such an occurrence
without more information than is at present available;
especially in view of the experience of Brutus Jackson,
which I give above. In a letter to Mr. Hornaday a New
Mexican hunter, Mr. J. W. Carter, of Truchas, states
that cougars rip with their claws in killing game, and
that, whether the quarry is a horse, deer, or calf, the
cougar begins to eat at the neck. When at bay a cougar
kills dogs by biting them, usually in the head ; the claws
are used merely to scratch or rip, or to drag the dog
within reach of the jaws, and to hold it for the fatal bite.
Miss Velvin's studies of dangerous wild beasts in cap-
tivity show that the cougar is ordinarily more playful
and less wantonly ferocious than the big spotted cats;
but that there is a wide individual variation among cou-
gars, a few being treacherous, bad-tempered and danger-
ous. Mr. Bostock, the animal trainer, states that the
cougar is as a rule rather stupid and far less courageous
or dangerous than the other big cats, the proportion of
vicious individuals being very small. He regards bears
as being very dangerous.
Mr. Charles Sheldon informs me that while on a
384 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
ranch near Chihuahua he at different times kept loose,
as pets, a female cougar, three wolves, and several coyotes,
all taken when very young. All were exceedingly tame
and even affectionate, save at the moment of eating.
Mr. W. H. Wright, of Spokane, Wash., is a hunter
of wide experience, and has probably made as close a life
study of the bear — particularly the grizzly — as anyone
now alive. In speaking to me, he dwells on its wide
variation in habits, not only as among individuals, but as
between all the individuals of one locality when com-
pared with those of another. Thus, in the Big Horn or
the Teton Mountains if an animal is killed, he has in his
experience found that any grizzly within range is almost
sure to come to the carcass (and this has been my expe-
rience in the same region). In the Bitter Roots, where
the bears live largely on fish, berries and roots, he found
the chances just about even whether the bears would or
would not come; whereas in the Selkirks, he found that
the bears would very rarely pay any attention to a car-
cass, this being a place where game is comparatively
scarce and where there are no salmon, so that the bears
live exclusively as vegetarians, save for eating small mam-
mals or insects. In the Bitter Roots Mountains the bears
used to live chiefly on fish in the spring and early in the
fall; in the summer they fed to a large extent on the
shooting star, which grows on all the marshes and is one
of the familiar plants of the region, but did not touch
either the dog-tooth violet or the spring beauty, both of
which have little tubers on the roots. But in the Koote-
nay country he found that the bears dug up acres and
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 385
acres of these very dog-tooth violets and spring beauties
for the sake of the bulbs on their roots; and that they
rarely or never touched the shooting stars. All this illus-
trates the extreme care which should be taken in making
observations and in dogmatizing from insufficient data;
and also the absolute necessity, if a full and accurate
natural history is to be written, of drawing upon the
experience of very many different observers — provided,
of course, that they are trustworthy observers.
For every one of our large beasts there should be at
least one such work as Lewis Morgan's book on the
beaver. The observations of many different men, all
accurate observers of wide experience, will be needed to
make any such book complete. Most hunters can now
and then supply some interesting experiences. Thus Gif-
ford Pinchot and Harry Stimson, while in the Montana
Rockies last fall saw a she white goat beat off a war eagle
which had attacked her yearling young. The eagle
swooped on the yearling in most determined fashion; but
the old she, rising on her hind legs, caught the great bird
fairly on her horns; and the eagle was too roughly han-
dled to repeat the onslaught. At nearly the same time,
in British Columbia, Senator Penrose and his brother
were hunting bears. The brother killed a yearling
grizzly. While standing over the body, the old she
appeared and charged him. She took two bullets with-
out flinching, knocked him down, bit him severely, and
would undoubtedly have killed him had she not in the
nick of time succumbed to her own mortal wounds.
Recently there has appeared a capital series of obser-
386 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
vations on wolves by a trained field naturalist, Mr. Ver-
non Bailey. These first-hand studies of wolves in their
natural haunts show, among other things, that, unlike the
male cougar, the male wolf remains with the female
while she is rearing her young litter and, at least some-
times, forages for her and them. According to Mr.
Bailey's observations the female dens remote from all
other females, having a large number of pups in a litter;
but the following interesting letter shows that in excep-
tional cases two females may den together or near by
one another. It is written to Mr. Phillips, the joint
author, with W. T. Hornaday, of the admirable " Camp-
Fires in the Canadian Rockies," a book as interesting and
valuable to the naturalist as to the hunter. The letter
runs as follows:
"Meyers Falls, Wash., Dec. 23, 1906.
" Mr. John M. Phillips, Pittsburg, Pa.
" Friend Jack: Your favor of the i8th inst. to hand, and
was very much pleased to hear you had called on the President
and to know that you take so much interest in the protection
of Pennsylvania game. It is a step in the right direction. In
regard to wolves I have hunted them a great deal when they
had pups and do not think I would exaggerate any to say that
I had found one hundred dens and had destroyed the young.
Often would be able to kill the mother. What you read in the
East about the dog wolf helping to raise the young is true.
They stay together until the young is large enough to go with
them and they all kill their food together because they can
handle a large brute easier. I found once, in Wyoming, seven-
teen wolf pups in one den, eight black ones and nine greys.
One of the females was also black and one grey, and both dogs
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 387
were grey. One of the dogs was the largest I ever seen, and
had the biggest foot. He made a track a third larger than
any I ever saw. The old ones had evidently just butchered and
was feeding the little ones when I came in sight about 400
yards away. I believe a wolf has got the quickest eye of any
animal living, and just as my head came up over the hill the
old ones all looked my way apparently at the same time. It
was too far to shoot so I thought I would pretend I did not
see them and just simply ride by. After riding some distance
three of the old ones began to move away and to my surprise
the big fellow came over to head me off. He was just on top
of a bench about 100 feet high, and I knew it would not do
to get down to shoot as one jump would take him out of sight
so I cracked my heels and let my pony have them in the abdo-
men and ran for the top of the hill, but was running against
the wind and when I reached the top my eyes was watering
so I could not kill him, but give him a close call as I got a
lock of his hair, I found another den the same spring (in
1899) and I got eight pups and there was five old ones. They
had to go some distance to find horses and cattle and there was
a plain trail that I could follow at least five miles without snow.
Colts seem to be their favorite dish when they can get them.^
1 My own experience has been that wolves are more apt to kill cattle than
horses, whereas with cougars the reverse is true. It is another instance ot
variability — doubtless both in the observed and the observers. Wolves may
seize an animal anywhere in a scuffle, and a pack will literally tear a small deer to
pieces; but when one or two wolves attack a big animal, like a bull caribou, elk or
moose, or a horse or a steer, the killing or crippling woimds are inflicted in the
flanks, hams or throat. Very rarely an animal is seized by the head. To any
real naturalist or hunter, or indeed to any competent observer, it is unnecessary
to say that no wolf, and no other wild beast, ever bites, or can by any possibility
bite, one of these large animals, like a horse, moose, or caribou, in the heart;
yet an occasional " nature fakir," more than usually reckless in his untruthfulness,
will assert that such incidents do happen; and, what is even more remarkable,
uninformed people of more than average credulity appear to believe the assertion.
388 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
Wolves mate in January and have their pups in March, but
found one den once in February. Have known a few to have
their young as late as April ist. The pups grow faster than
our domestic animals and usually leave the dens in May. I
do not think the mother enters the den (after the pups get
large enough to come out) in order to suckle them, as you
can call them out by hiding and making a whining noise. For
example, I set a No. 4 beaver trap in a hole where there was
a lot of large pups and hid a little way off and made a noise
like the female when calling and apparently they all started
out at the same time and I caught two at once in the same trap
and of course each one thought the other was biting his leg
and I saw the most vicious scrap I ever seen out of animals
of their size. They just held on to one another like bull dogs
and apparently did not know I was around.
" Wolves go a long way sometimes for their food. I have
tracked them twenty-five miles from where they made a killing
before finding their den. The old dog will sometimes go off
alone but does not often kill when by himself. Would just
as soon have a male track as a female to follow for if you will
stay with it it is dead sure to lead to a den and it is easy to
distinguish the difference between the two tracks if you are on
to your job.
" Wishing you a Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year,
I am,
" Your same old friend,
" R. M. NORBOE."
Mr. Bailey is one of a number of faunal naturalists,
who, together with certain big game hunters who care
more for natural history than for mere slaughter, are
doing invaluable work in preserving the records of wil-
derness life. If Mr. George Shiras will put in book
IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 389
form his noteworthy collection of photographs of game,
and of other wild creatures, and his numerous field notes
thereon, he will render a real and great service to all
lovers of nature.
The most exciting and interesting hunting book that
has recently appeared deals with African big game.
Many thrilling adventures with lions have been recorded
since the days when the Assyrian kings engraved on stone
their exploits in the chase; but the best lion stories that
have ever been written are those in Colonel Patterson's
*' Maneaters of Tsavo."
It is now (January, 1908) nearly five years since my
last trip to the Yellowstone Park. General Samuel
Young, who is now in charge of the park, informs me
that on the whole the game and the wild creatures gen-
erally in the park have increased during this period. The
antelope he reports as being certainly three times as
numerous as they were ten years ago, and nearly twice
as numerous as when I was out there. In the town of
Gardiner they graze freely in the streets; not only the
inhabitants but even the dogs recognizing them as friends.
Their chief foes are the coyotes. Last October four full-
grown antelope were killed by coyotes on the Gardiner
and Yellowstone flats, and many fawns were destroyed by
them during the season. Practically all of the antelope
in the park herd on the Gardiner flat and round about
during the winter, and during the present winter there
is a good supply of hay on this flat, which is being used
to feed the antelope, mountain sheep, deer and elk. The
sheep are increasing in numbers. Probably about two
390
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
hundred of them now exist in the park. There are prob-
ably one hundred whitetail and one thousand blacktail
deer, both of which species are likewise increasing; and
the moose, although few in numbers, are also on the
increase. General Young reports that from his best in-
formation he believes there are 25,000 wapiti in the park.
Of the buffalo there are now in fenced pastures fifty-nine.
These increase very slowly, the number of calves being
small. There are probably about twenty-five of the origi-
nal wild buffalo still alive. The bears are as numerous
as ever. Last summer it became necessary to kill one
black and two grizzlies that had become dangerous; for
some individuals among the bears grow insolent under
good treatment. The mountain lions, which five years
ago were so destructive to the deer and sheep, have been
almost exterminated. The tracks show that one still
exists. Coyotes are numerous and very destructive to the
antelope, although ninety-nine were destroyed during the
past year. Beaver are abundant and are increasing.
Altogether the American people are to be congratulated
upon the success of the Yellowstone Park, not only as a
national pleasure ground, but as a national reserve for
keeping alive the great and beautiful wild creatures of
the wilderness.
CHAPTER XIII
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS
There is ample room for more complete life histories
of many small beasts that are common enough around our
country homes; and fortunately the need is now being
met by various good field naturalists. Just last summer,
in mid-July, 1907, I had an entirely novel experience
with foxes, which illustrates how bold naturally shy crea-
tures sometimes are after nightfall. Some of the boys and
I were camping for the night on the beach by the Sound,
under a clay bluff, having gone thither in the dory and
the two light rowing skiffs; it was about a quarter of a
mile from the place where we had seen the big red fox
four or five years previously. The fire burned all night,
and one or other of the party would now and then rise
and stand by it; nevertheless, two young foxes, evidently
cubs of the year, came round the fire, within plain sight,
half a dozen times. They were picking up scraps; two
or three times they came within ten yards of the fire.
They were very active, scampering up the bluffs; and
when in the bushes made a good deal of noise, whereas a
full-grown fox generally moves in silence even when in
dead brush.
Small mammals, with the exception of squirrels, are
so much less conspicuous than birds, and indeed usually
pass their lives in such seclusion, that the ordinary ob-
391
392
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
server is hardly aware of their presence. At Sagamore
Hill, for instance, except at haying time I rarely see the
swarming meadow mice, the much less plentiful pine
mice, or the little mole-shrews, alive, unless they happen
to drop into a pit or sunken area which has been dug at
one point to let light through a window into the cellar.
The much more graceful and attractive white-footed mice
and jumping mice are almost as rarely seen, though if
one does come across a jumping mouse it at once attracts
attention by its extraordinary leaps. The jumping mouse
hibernates, like the woodchuck; and so does the chip-
munk, though not always. The other little animals just
mentioned are abroad all winter, the meadow mice under
the snow, the white-footed mice, and often the shrews,
above the snow. The tell-tale snow, showing all the
tracks, betrays the hitherto unsuspected existence of many
little creatures; and the commonest marks upon it are
those of the rabbit and especially of the white-footed
mouse. The shrew walks or trots and makes alternate
footsteps in the snow. White-foot, on the contrary, always
jumps, whether going slow or fast, and his hind feet leave
their prints side by side, often with the mark where the
tail has dragged. I think white-foot is the most plenti-
ful of all our furred wild creatures, taken as a whole.
He climbs trees well ; I have found his nest in an old
vireo's nest; but more often under stumps or boards. The
meadow mice often live in the marshes, and are entirely
at home in the water.
The shrew-mouse which I most often find is a short-
tailed, rather thickset little creature, not wholly unlike
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS
393
his cousin the shrew-mole, and just as greedy and fero-
cious. When a boy I captured one of these mole-shrews
and found to my astonishment that he was a bloodthirsty
and formidable little beast of prey. He speedily killed
and ate a partially grown white-footed mouse which I
put in the same cage with him. (I think a full-grown
mouse of this kind would be an overmatch for a shrew.)
I then put a small snake in with him. The shrew was
very active but seemed nearly blind, and as he ran to and
fro he never seemed to be aware of the presence of any-
thing living until he was close to it, when he would in-
stantly spring on it like a tiger. On this occasion he
attacked the little snake with great ferocity, and after
an animated struggle in which the snake whipped and
rolled all around the cage, throwing the shrew to and
fro a dozen times, the latter killed and ate the snake
in triumph. Larger snakes frequently eat shrews, by
the way.
Once last summer, while several of us were playing
on the tennis ground, a mole-shrew suddenly came out
on the court. I first saw him near one of the side lines,
and ran after him; I picked him up in my naked hand,
whereupon he bit me, and I then took him in my hand-
kerchief. After we had all looked at him I put him
down, and he scuttled off among the grass and went down
a little hole. We resumed our game, but after a few
minutes the shrew reappeared, and this time crossed the
tennis court near the net, while we gathered about him.
He was an absurd little creature and his motion in run-
ning was precisely like that of one of those mechanical
394
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
toys in the shape of mice or little bears which are wound
up and run around on wheels. When we put our rackets
before him he uttered little, shrill, long-continued squeals
of irritation. We let him go off in the grass, and this
time he did not reappear for the day; but next afternoon
he repeated the feat.
My boys have at intervals displayed a liking for natu-
ral history, and one of them during some years took to
trapping small mammals, discovering species that I had
no idea existed in certain places; near Washington, but
on the other side of the Potomac, he trapped several of
those very dainty little creatures, the harvest mice.^ One
of my other boys — the special friend of Josiah the badger
— discovered a flying-squirrel's nest, in connection with
which a rather curious incident occurred. The little
boy had climbed a tree which is hollow at the top ; and
in this hollow he discovered a flying-squirrel mother with
six young ones. She seemed so tame and friendly that the
little boy for a moment hardly realized that she was a
wild thing, and called down that he had " found a guinea
pig up the tree." Finally, the mother made up her mind
to remove her family. She took each one in turn in her
mouth and flew or sailed down from the top of the tree
to the foot of another tree near by; ran up this, holding
the little squirrel in her mouth; and again sailed down
to the foot of another tree some distance off. Here she
deposited her young one on the grass, and then, reversing
1 A visit of this same small boy, when eleven years old, to John Burroughs,
is described by the latter in *♦ Far and Near," in the chapter called " Babes in
the Woods."
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS 395
the process, climbed and sailed back to the tree where the
nest was; then she took out another young one and re-
turned with it, in exactly the same fashion as with the
first. She repeated this until all six of the young ones
were laid on the bank, side by side in a row, all with their
heads the same way. Finding that she was not molested
she ultimately took all six of the little fellows back to
her nest, where she reared her brood undisturbed.
Flying squirrels become very gentle and attractive
little pets if taken into the house. I cannot say as much
for gray squirrels. Once when a small boy I climbed up
to a large nest of dry leaves in the fork of a big chestnut
tree, and from it picked out three very young squirrels.
One died, but the other two I succeeded in rearing on a
milk diet, which at first I was obliged to administer with
a syringe. They grew up absolutely tame and would
climb all over the various members of the household; but
as they grew older they grew cross. If we children did
something they did not like they would not only scold us
vigorously, but, if they thought the provocation war-
ranted it, would bite severely; and we finally exiled them
to the woods. Gray squirrels, I am sorry to say, rob nests
just as red squirrels do. At Sagamore Hill I have more
than once been attracted by the alarm notes of various
birds, and on investigation have found the winged wood-
land people in great agitation over a gray squirrel's as-
sault on the eggs or young of a thrush or vireo; and once
one of these good-looking marauders came up the hill to
harry a robin's nest near the house. Many years ago I
had an extraordinary experience with a gray squirrel.
396 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
I was in the edge of some woods, and, seeing a squirrel, I
stood motionless. The squirrel came to me and actually
climbed up me; I made no movement until it began to
nibble at my elbow, biting through my flannel shirt.
When I moved, it of course jumped off, but it did not
seem much frightened and lingered for some minutes in
view, about thirty yards away. I have never understood
the incident.
Among the small mammals at Sagamore Hill the
chipmunks are the most familiar and the most in evi-
dence; for they readily become tame and confiding. For
three or four years a chipmunk — I suppose the same chip-
munk — has lived near the tennis court; and it has devel-
oped the rather puzzling custom of sometimes scamper-
ing across the court while we are in the middle of a game.
This has happened two or three times every year, and is
rather difficult to explain, for the chipmunk could just
as well go round the court, and there seems no possible
reason why he should suddenly run out on it while the
game is in full swing. If we see him, we all stop to
watch him, and then he may himself stop and look about;
but we may not see him until just as he is finishing a
frantic scurry across, in imminent danger of being
stepped on.
The most attractive and sociable pet among wild
creatures of its size I have found to be a coon. One
which when I was a boy I brought up from the time it
was very young, was as playful and affectionate as any
little dog, and used its little black paws just as if they
were hands. Coons, by the way, sometimes appear in
AUDREY TAKES THE BARS
From a photograph, copyright, 1907, by Clinedinst
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS
397
political campaigns. Frequently when I have been on
the stump in places where there was still a strong tradi-
tion of the old Whig party as it was in the days of Henry
Clay and Tippecanoe Harrison, I have reviewed pro-
cessions in which log cabins and coons were prominent
features. The log cabins were usually miniature rep-
resentations, mounted on wheels, but the coons were gen-
uine. Each was usually carried by some enthusiast, who
might lead it by a chain and collar, but more frequently
placed it upon a platform at the end of a pole, chained
up short. Most naturally the coon protested violently
against the proceedings; his only satisfaction being the
certainty that every now and then some other parader
would stumble near enough to be bitten. At one place
an admirer suddenly presented me with one of these coons
and was then swept on in the crowd; leaving me gingerly
holding by the end of a chain an exceedingly active and
short-tempered little beast, which I had not the slightest
idea how to dispose of. On two other occasions, by the
way, while off on campaign trips I was presented with
bears. These I firmly refused to receive. One of them
was brought to a platform by an old mountain hunter
who, I am afraid, really had his feelings hurt by the
refusal. The other bear made his appearance at Port-
land, Ore., and, of all places, was chained on top of a
wooden platform just aft the smokestack of an engine,
the engine being festooned with American flags. He
belonged to the fireman, who had brought him as a
special gift; I being an honorary member of the Brother-
hood of Locomotive Firemen. His owner explained that
398 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
normally he was friendly; but the surroundings had cur-
dled his temper.
Usually birds are very regular in their habits, so that
not only the same species but the same individuals breed
in the same places year after year. In spite of their wings
they are almost as local as mammals and the same pair
will usually keep to the same immediate neighborhood,
where they can always be looked for in their season.
There are wooded or brush-grown swampy places not far
from the White House where in the spring or summer I
can count with certainty upon seeing wrens, chats, and
the ground-loving Kentucky warbler, an attractive little
bird, which, by the way, itself looks much like a miniature
chat. There are other places, in the neighborhood of
Rock Creek, where I can be almost certain of finding
the blue-gray gnatcatcher, which ranks just next to the
humming-bird itself in exquisite daintiness and delicacy.
The few pairs of mocking-birds around Washington have
just as sharply defined haunts.
Nevertheless it is never possible to tell when one may
run across a rare bird; and even birds that are not rare,
now and then show marked individual idiosyncrasy in
turning up, or even breeding, in unexpected places. At
Sagamore Hill, for instance, I never knew a purple finch
to breed until the summer of 1906. Then two pairs
nested with us, one right by the house and the other near
the stable. My attention was drawn to them by the bold,
cheerful singing of the males, who were spurred to rivalry
by one another's voices. In September of the same year,
while sitting in a rocking-chair on the broad veranda
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS 399
looking out over the Sound, I heard the unmistakable
" ank-ank " of nuthatches from a young elm at one cor-
ner of the house. I strolled over, expecting to find the
white-bellied nuthatch, which is rather common on Long
Island. But instead there were a couple of red-bellied
nuthatches, birds familiar to me in the Northern woods,
but which I had never before seen at Sagamore Hill.
They were tame and fearless, running swiftly up and
down the tree-trunk and around the limbs while I stood
and looked at them not ten feet away. The two younger
boys ran out to see them; and then we hunted up their
picture in Wilson. I find, by the way, that Audubon's
and Wilson's are still the most satisfactory large orni-
thologies, at least for nature lovers who are not special-
ists; of course any attempt at serious study of our birds
means recourse to the numerous and excellent books and
pamphlets by recent observers. Bendire's large work
gives admirable biographies of all the birds it treats of;
unfortunately it was never finished.
In May, 1907, two pairs of robins built their substan-
tial nests, and raised their broods, on the piazza at Saga-
more Hill; one over the transom of the north hall door
and one over the transom of the south hall door. An-
other pair built their nest and raised their brood on a
rafter in the half-finished new barn, quite undisturbed by
the racket of the carpenters who were finishing it. A pair
of scarlet tanagers built near the tennis ground; the male
kept in the immediate neighborhood all the time, flaming
among the branches, and singing steadily until the last
part of July. To my ears the song of the tanager is like
400 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
a louder, more brilliant, less leisurely rendering of the
red-eyed vireo's song; but with the characteristic " chip-
churr " every now and then interspersed. Only one pair
of purple finches returned to us last summer; and for
the first time in many years no Baltimore orioles built
in the elm by the corner of the house; they began their
nest but for some reason left it unfinished. The red-
winged blackbirds, however, were more plentiful than
for years previously, and two pairs made their nests near
the old barn, where the grass stood lush and tall ; this was
the first time they had ever built nearer than the wood-
pile pond, and I believe it was owing to the season being
so cold and wet. It was perhaps due to the same cause
that so many black-throated green warblers spent June
and July in the woods on our place; they must have been
breeding, though I only noticed the males. Each kept to
his own special tract of woodland, among the tops of the
tall trees, seeming to prefer the locusts, and throughout
June, and far into July, each sang all day long — a drawl-
ing, cadenced little warble of five or six notes, the first
two being the most noticeable near by, though, rather
curiously, the next two were the notes that had most car-
rying power. The song was usually uttered at intervals
of a few seconds; sometimes while the singer was perched
motionless, sometimes as he flitted and crawled actively
among the branches. With the resident of one particular
grove I became well acquainted, as I was chopping a
path through the grove. Every day when I reached the
grove, I found the little warbler singing away, and at
least half the time in one particular locust tree. He paid
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS 401
not the slightest attention to my chopping; whereas a pair
of downy woodpeckers and a pair of great-crested fly-
catchers, both of them evidently nesting near by, were
much put out by my presence. While listening to my
little black-throated friend, I could also continually hear
the songs of his cousins, the prairie warbler, the redstart,
the black-and-white creeper and the Maryland yellow-
throat; not to speak of oven-birds, towhees, thrashers,
vireos, and the beautiful golden-voiced wood thrushes.
The black-throated green warblers have seemingly
become regular summer residents of Long Island, for
after discovering them on my place I found that two or
three bird-loving neighbors were already familiar with
them; and I heard them on several different occasions as
I rode through the country roundabout. I already knew
as summer residents in my neighborhood the following
representatives of the warbler family: the oven-bird, chat,
black-and-white creeper, Maryland yellow-throat, sum-
mer yellow-bird, prairie warbler, pine warbler, blue-
winged warbler, golden-winged warbler (very rare) , blue
yellow-backed warbler and redstart.
The black-throated green as a breeder and summer
resident is a newcomer who has extended his range south-
ward. But this same summer I found one warbler, the
presence of which, if more than accidental, means that a
southern form is extending its range northward. This
was the Dominican or yellow-throated warbler. Two of
my bird-loving neighbors are Mrs. E. H. Swan, Jr., and
Miss Alice Weekes. On July 4th Mrs. Swan told me
that a new warbler, the yellow-throated, was living near
402 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
their house, and that she and her husband had seen it
there on several occasions. I was rather skeptical, and
told her I thought that it must be a Maryland yellow-
throat. Mrs. Swan meekly acquiesced in the theory that
she might have been mistaken; but two or three days
afterward she sent me word that she and Miss Weekes
had seen the bird again, had examined it thoroughly
through their glasses, and were sure that it was a yellow-
throated warbler. Accordingly on the morning of the 8th
I walked down and met them both near Mrs. Swan's
house, about a mile from Sagamore Hill. We did not
have to wait long before we heard an unmistakably new
warbler's song, loud, ringing, sharply accented, just as
the yellow-throat's song is described in Chapman's book.
At first the little bird kept high in the tops of the pines,
but after a while he came to the lower branches and we
were able to see him distinctly. Only a glance was needed
to show that my two friends were quite right in their
identification and that the bird was undoubtedly the Do-
minican or yellow-throated warbler. Its bill was as long
as that of a black-and-white creeper, giving the head a
totally different look from that of any of its brethren,
the other true wood-warblers; and the olive-gray back,
yellow throat and breast, streaked sides, white belly, black
cheek and forehead, and white line above the eye and
spot on the side of the neck, could all be plainly made
out. The bird kept continually uttering its loud, sharply
modulated, and attractive warble. It never left the pines,
and though continually on the move, it yet moved with
a certain deliberation like a pine warbler, and not with
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SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS 403
the fussy agility of most of its kinsfolk. Occasionally it
would catch some insect on the wing, but most of the time
kept hopping about among the needle-clad clusters of the
pine twigs, or moving along the larger branches, stop-
ping from time to time to sing. Now and then it would
sit still on one twig for several minutes, singing at short
intervals and preening its feathers.
After looking at it for nearly an hour we had to solve
the rather difficult ethical question as to whether we
ought to kill it or not. In these cases it is always hard
to draw the line between heartlessness and sentimentality.
In our own minds we were sure of our identification,
and did not feel that we could be mistaken, but we were
none of us professed ornithologists, and as far as I knew
the bird was really rare thus far north; so that it seemed
best to shoot him, which was accordingly done. I was
influenced in this decision, in the first place because war-
blers are so small that it is difficult for any observer to
be absolutely certain as to their identification; and in the
next place by the fact that the breeding season was un-
doubtedly over, and that this was an adult male, so that
no harm came to the species. I very strongly feel that
there should be no " collecting " of rare and beautiful
species when this is not imperatively demanded. Mock-
ing-birds, for instance, are very beautiful birds, well
known and unmistakable; and there is not the slightest
excuse for " collecting " their nests and eggs or shooting
specimens of them, no matter where they may be found.
So, there is no excuse for shooting scarlet tanagers, sum-
mer redbirds, cardinals, nor of course any of the com-
404 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
mon, well-known friends of the lawn, the garden and
the farm land; and with most birds nowadays observa-
tions on their habits are of far more value than their
skins can possibly be. But there must be some shooting,
especially of obscure and little-known birds, or we would
never be able to identify them at all ; while most laymen
are not sufficiently close observers to render it possible
to trust their identification of rare species.
In one apple tree in the orchard we find a flicker's
nest every year; the young make a queer, hissing, bub-
bling sound, a little like the boiling of a pot. This same
year one of the young ones fell out; I popped it back into
the hole, whereupon its brothers and sisters " boiled " for
several minutes like the cauldron of a small and friendly
witch. John Burroughs, and a Long Island neighbor,
John Lewis Childs, drove over to see me, in this same
June of 1907, and I was able to show them the various
birds of most interest — the purple finch, the black-
throated green warbler, the redwings in their unexpected
nesting place by the old barn, and the orchard orioles and
yellow-billed cuckoos in the garden. The orchard orioles
this year took much interest in the haying, gleaning in
the cut grass for grasshoppers. The barn swallows that
nest in the stable raised second broods, which did not
leave the nest until the end of July. When the barn
swallows gather in their great flocks just prior to the
southward migration, the gathering sometimes takes place
beside a house, and then the swallows seem to get so
excited and bewildered that they often fly into the house.
When I was a small boy I took a keen, although not a
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS 405
very intelligent, interest in natural history, and solemnly
recorded whatever I thought to be notable. When I was
nine years old we were passing the summer near Tarry-
town, on the Hudson. My diary for September 4, 1868,
runs as follows: " Cold and rainy. I was called in from
breakfast to a room. When I went in there what was
my surprise to see on walls, curtains and floor about forty
swallows. All the morning long in every room of the
house (even the kitchen) were swallows. They were
flying south. Several hundred were outside and about
seventy-five in the house. I caught most of them (and
put them out of the windows) . The others got out them-
selves. One flew on my pants where he stayed until I
took him off."
At the White House we are apt to stroll around the
grounds for a few minutes after breakfast; and during the
migrations, especially in spring, I often take a pair of
field glasses so as to examine any bird as to the identity
of which I am doubtful. From the end of April the
warblers pass in troops — myrtle, magnolia, chestnut-
sided, bay-breasted, blackburnian, black-throated blue,
blue-winged, Canadian, and many others, with at the very
end of the season the black-poll — all of them exquisite
little birds, but not conspicuous as a rule, except perhaps
the blackburnian, whose brilliant orange throat and
breast flame when they catch the sunlight as he flits among
the trees. The males in their dress of courtship are easily
recognized by any one who has Chapman's book on the
warblers. On May 4, 1906, I saw a Cape May warbler,
the first I had ever seen. It was in a small pine. It was
4o6 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
fearless, allowing a close approach, and as it was a male
in high plumage, it was unmistakable.
In 1907, after a very hot week in early March, we
had an exceedingly late and cold spring. The first bird
I heard sing in the White House grounds was a white-
throated sparrow on March ist, a song sparrow speedily
following. The white-throats stayed with us until the
middle of May, overlapping the arrival of the indigo
buntings ; but during the last week in April and first week
in May their singing was drowned by the music of the
purple finches, which I never before saw in such num-
bers around the White House. When we sat by the south
fountain, under an apple tree then blossoming, sometimes
three or four purple finches would be singing in the fra-
grant bloom overhead. In June a pair of wood thrushes
and a pair of black-and-white creepers made their homes
in the White House grounds, in addition to our ordinary
homemakers, the flickers, redheads, robins, catbirds, song
sparrows, chippies, summer yellow-birds, grackles, and,
I am sorry to say, crows. A handsome sapsucker spent a
week with us. In the same year five night herons spent
January and February in a swampy tract by the Poto-
mac, half a mile or so from the White House.
At Mount Vernon there are of course more birds than
there are around the White House, for it is in the country.
At present but one mocking-bird sings around the house
itself, and in the gardens and the woods of the immedi-
ate neighborhood. Phoebe birds nest at the heads of the
columns under the front portico; and a pair — or rather,
doubtless, a succession of pairs — has nested in Washing-
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS 407
ton's tomb itself, for the twenty years since I have known
it. The cardinals, beautiful in plumage, and with clear
ringing voices, are characteristic of the place. I am
glad to say that the woods still hold many gray — not red
— foxes; the descendants of those which Washington so
perseveringly hunted.
At Oyster Bay on a desolate winter afternoon many
years ago I shot an Ipswich sparrow on a strip of ice-
rimmed beach, where the long coarse grass waved in
front of a growth of blue berries, beach plums and
stunted pines. I think it was the same winter that we
were visited not only by flocks of cross-bills, pine linnets,
red-polls and pine grossbeaks, but by a number of snowy
owls, which flitted to and fro in ghost-like fashion across
the wintry landscape and showed themselves far more
diurnal in their habits than our native owls. One fall
about the same time a pair of duck-hawks appeared of¥
the bay. It was early, before many ducks had come, and
they caused havoc among the night herons, which were
then very numerous in the marshes around Lloyd's Neck,
there being a big heronry in the woods near by. Once
I saw a duck-hawk come around the bend of the shore,
and dart into a loose gang of young night herons, still in
the brown plumage, which had jumped from the marsh
at my approach. The pirate struck down three herons in
succession and sailed swiftly on without so much as look-
ing back at his victims.^ The herons, which are usually
1 Dr. Lambert last fall, on a hunting trip in Northern Quebec, found a gyrfal-
con on an island in a lake which had just killed a great blue heron; the heron's
feathers were scattered all over the lake. Lambert also shot a great horned owl
in the dusk one evening, and found that it had a half-eaten duck in its claws.
4o8 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
rather dull birds, showed every sign of terror whenever
the duck-hawk appeared in the distance; whereas, they
paid no heed to the fish-hawks as they sailed overhead.
I found the carcass of a black-headed or Bonaparte's
gull which had probably been killed by one of these
duck-hawks; these gulls appear in the early fall, before
their bigger brothers, the herring gulls, have come for
their winter stay. The spotted sand-pipers often build
far away from water; while riding, early in July, 1907,
near Cold Spring, my horse almost stepped on a little
fellow that could only just have left the nest. It was in
a dry road between upland fields; the parents were near
by, and betrayed much agitation. The little fish-crows
are not rare around Washington, though not so common
as the ordinary crows; once I shot one at Oyster Bay.
They are not so wary as their larger kinsfolk, but are
quite as inveterate destroyers of the eggs and nestlings
of more attractive birds. The soaring turkey buzzards,
so beautiful on the wing and so loathsome near by, are
seen everywhere around the Capital.
Bird songs are often puzzling, and it is nearly impos-
sible to write them down so that any one but the writer
will recognize them. Moreover, as we ascribe to them
qualities, such as plaintiveness or gladness, which really
exist in our own minds and not in the songs themselves,
two different observers, equally accurate, may ascribe
widely different qualities to the same song. To me, for
instance, the bush sparrow's song is more attractive than
the vesper sparrow's; but I think most of my friends feel
just the reverse way about the two songs. To most of
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS 409
us the bobolink's song bubbles over with rollicking mer-
riment, with the glad joy of mere living; whereas the
thrushes, the meadow lark, the white-throated sparrow,
all have a haunting strain of sadness or plaintiveness in
their melody; but I am by no means sure that there is
the slightest difference of this kind in the singers. Most
of the songs of the common birds I recognize fairly well;
but even with these birds there will now and then be a
call, or a few bars, which I do not recognize; and if I
hear a bird but seldom, I find much difficulty in recall-
ing its song, unless it is very well marked indeed. Last
spring I for a long time utterly failed to recognize the
song of a water thrush by Rock Creek; and later in the
season I on one occasion failed to make out the flight song
of an oven-bird until in the middle of it the singer sud-
denly threw in two or three of the characteristic " teacher,
teacher " notes. Even in neighborhoods with which I am
familiar I continually hear songs and calls which I can-
not place.
In Albemarle County, Virginia, we have a little place
called Pine Knot, where we sometimes go, taking some
or all of the children, for a three or four days' outing.
It is a mile from the big stock farm, Plain Dealing,
belonging to an old friend, Mr. Joseph Wilmer. The
trees and flowers are like those of Washington, but their
general close resemblance to those of Long Island is set off
by certain exceptions. There are osage orange hedges,
and in spring many of the roads are bordered with bands
of the brilliant yellow blossoms of the flowering broom,
introduced by Jefferson. There are great willow oaks
41 o AN AMERICAN HUNTER
here and there in the woods or pastures, and occasional
groves of noble tulip trees in the many stretches of forest;
these tulip trees growing to a much larger size than on
Long Island. As at Washington, among the most plen-
tiful flowers are the demure little Quaker Ladies, which
are not found at Sagamore Hill — where we also miss
such northern forms as the wake robin and the other
trilliums, which used to be among the characteristic
marks of spring-time at Albany. At Pine Knot the red
bug, dogwood and laurel are plentiful; though in the
case of the last two no more so than at Sagamore Hill.
The azalea — its Knickerbocker name in New York was
pinkster — grows and flowers far more luxuriantly than
on Long Island. The moccasin flower, the china-blue
Virginia cowslip with its pale pink buds, the blood-red
Indian pink, the painted columbine and many, many
other flowers somewhat less showy carpet the woods.
The birds are, of course, for the most part the same as
on Long Island, but with some differences. These differ-
ences are, in part, due to the more southern locality; but
in part I cannot explain them, for birds will often be
absent from one place seemingly without any real reason.
Thus around us in Albemarle County song sparrows are
certainly rare and I have not seen savanna sparrows at
all; but the other common sparrows, such as the chippy,
field sparrow, vesper sparrow, and grasshopper sparrow
abound; and in an open field where bind-weed morning
glories and evening primroses grew among the broom
sedge, I found some small grass-dwelling sparrows, which
with the exercise of some little patience I was able to
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS 411
study at close quarters with the glasses; as I had no gun
I could not be positive about their identification, though
I was inclined to believe that they were Henslow's spar-
rows. Of birds of brilliant color there are six species —
the cardinal, the summer redbird and the scarlet tanager,
in red, and the bluebird, indigo bunting, and blue gross-
beak, in blue. I saw but one pair of blue grossbeaks;
but the little indigo buntings abound, and bluebirds are
exceedingly common, breeding in numbers. It has al-
ways been a puzzle to me why they do not breed around
us at Sagamore Hill, where I only see them during the
migrations. Neither the rosy summer redbirds nor the
cardinals are quite as brilliant as the scarlet tanagers,
which fairly burn like live flames; but the tanager is
much less common than either of the others in Albemarle
County, and it is much less common than it is at Saga-
more Hill. Among the singers the wood thrush is not
common, but the meadow lark abounds. The yellow-
breasted chat is everywhere and in the spring its cluck-
ing, whistling and calling seem never to stop for a minute.
The white-eyed vireo is found in the same thick under-
growth as the chat and among the smaller birds it is one
of those most in evidence to the ear. In one or two places
I came across parties of the long-tailed Bewick's wren,
as familiar as the house wren but with a very different
song. There are gentle mourning doves; and black-billed
cuckoos seem more common than the yellow-bills. The
mocking-birds are, as always, most interesting. I was
much amused to see one of them following two crows;
when they lit in a plowed field the mocking-bird paraded
412
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
alongside of them six feet ofif, and then fluttered around
to the attack. The crows, however, were evidently less
bothered by it than they would have been by a kingbird.
At Plain Dealing many birds nest within a stone's throw
of the rambling attractive house, with its numerous out-
buildings, old garden, orchard, and venerable locusts
and catalpas. Among them are Baltimore and orchard
orioles, purple grackles, flickers and red-headed wood-
peckers, bluebirds, robins, kingbirds and indigo buntings.
One observation which I made was of real interest. On
May 1 8, 1907, I saw a small party of a dozen or so of
passenger pigeons, birds I had not seen for a quarter of
a century and never expected to see again. I saw them
two or three times flying hither and thither with great
rapidity, and once they perched in a tall dead pine on the
edge of an old field. They were unmistakable; yet the
sight was so unexpected that I almost doubted my eyes,
and I welcomed a bit of corroborative evidence coming
from Dick, the colored foreman at Plain Dealing. Dick
is a frequent companion of mine in rambles around the
country, and he is an unusually close and accurate ob-
server of birds, and of wild things generally. Dick had
mentioned to me having seen some " wild carrier pig-
eons," as he called them; and, thinking over this remark
of his, after I had returned to Washington, I began to
wonder whether he too might not have seen passenger
pigeons. Accordingly I wrote to Mr. Wilmer, asking
him to question Dick and find out what the " carrier
pigeons " looked like. His answering letter runs in part
as follows :
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS 413
" On May 12th last Dick saw a flock of about thirty wild
pigeons, followed at a short distance by about half as many,
flying in a circle very rapidly, between the Plain Dealing
house and the woods, where they disappeared. They had
pointed tails and resembled somewhat large doves — the breast
and sides rather a brownish red. He had seen them before,
but many years ago. I think it is unquestionably the passenger
pigeon — Ectopistes migratorhis — described on p. 25 of the 5th
volume of Audubon. I remember the pigeon roosts as he de-
scribes them, on a smaller scale, but large flocks have not been
seen in this part of Virginia for many years."
I fear, by the way, that the true prairie chicken, one
of the most characteristic American game birds, W\\\ soon
follow the passenger pigeon. My two elder sons have
now and then made trips for prairie chickens and ducks
to the Dakotas. Last summer, 1907, the second boy re-
turned from such a trip — which he had ended by a suc-
cessful deer hunt in Wisconsin — with the melancholy in-
formation that the diminution in the ranks of the prairie
fowl in the Dakotas was very evident.
The house at Pine Knot consists of one long room,
with a broad piazza, below, and three small bedrooms
above. It is made of wood, with big outside chimneys
at each end. Wood rats and white-footed mice visit it;
once a weasel came in after them; now a flying squirrel
has made his home among the rafters. On one side the
pines and on the other side the oaks come up to the walls ;
in front the broom sedge grows almost to the piazza and
above the line of its waving plumes we look across the
beautiful rolling Virginia farm country to the foot-hills
414
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
of the Blue Ridge. At night whippoorwills call inces-
santly around us. In the late spring or early summer we
usually take breakfast and dinner on the veranda listen-
ing to mocking-bird, cardinal, and Carolina wren, as well
as to many more common singers. In the winter the lit-
tle house can only be kept warm by roaring fires in the
great open fireplaces, for there is no plaster on the walls,
nothing but the bare wood. Then the table is set near
the blazing logs at one end of the long room which makes
up the lower part of the house, and at the other end the
colored cook — ^Jim Crack by name — prepares the deli-
cious Virginia dinner; while around him cluster the
little darkies, who go on errands, bring in wood, or fetch
water from the spring, to put in the bucket which stands
below where the gourd hangs on the wall. Outside the
wind moans or the still cold bites if the night is quiet;
but inside there is warmth and light and cheer.
There are plenty of quail and rabbits in the fields
and woods near by, so we live partly on what our guns
bring in; and there are also wild turkeys. I spent the
first three days of November, 1906, in a finally success-
ful effort to kill a wild turkey. Each morning I left
the house between three and five o'clock, under a cold
brilliant moon. The frost was heavy; and my horse
shuffled over the frozen ruts as I rode after Dick. I
was on the turkey grounds before the faintest streak of
dawn had appeared in the east; and I worked as long
as daylight lasted. It was interesting and attractive in
spite of the cold. In the night we heard the quavering
screech owls; and occasionally the hooting of one of
^^'
ROSWELL BEHAVES LIKE A GENTLEMAN
From a photograph, copyright, 1907, by Clinedinst
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS 415
their bigger brothers. At dawn we listened to the lusty
hammering of the big logcocks, or to the curious cough-
ing or croaking sound of a hawk before it left its roost.
Now and then loose flocks of small birds straggled past
us as we sat in the blind, or rested to eat our lunch;
chickadees, tufted tits, golden-crested kinglets, creepers,
cardinals, various sparrows and small woodpeckers.
Once we saw a shrike pounce on a field mouse by a
haystack; once we came on a ruffed grouse sitting motion-
less in the road.
The last day I had with me Jim Bishop, a man who
had hunted turkeys by profession, a hard-working farmer,
whose ancestors have for generations been farmers and
woodmen; an excellent hunter, tireless, resourceful, with
an eye that nothing escaped; just the kind of a man one
likes to regard as typical of what is best in American life.
Until this day, and indeed until the very end of this day,
chance did not favor us. We tried to get up to the turkeys
on the roost before daybreak; but they roosted in pines
and, night though it was, they were evidently on the look-
out, for they always saw us long before we could make
them out, and then we could hear them fly out of the tree-
tops. Turkeys are quite as wary as deer, and we never
got a sight of them while we were walking through the
woods; but two or three times we flushed gangs, and my
companion then at once built a little blind of pine boughs
in which we sat while he tried to call the scattered birds
up to us by imitating, with marvellous fidelity, their
yelping. Twice a turkey started toward us, but on each
occasion the old hen began calling some distance ofif and
41 6 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
all the scattered birds at once went toward her. At other
times I would slip around to one side of a wood while
my companion walked through it, but either there were
no turkeys or they went out somewhere far away from me.
On the last day I was out thirteen hours. Finally,
late in the afternoon, Jim Bishop marked a turkey into
a point of pines which stretched from a line of wooded
hills down into a narrow open valley on the other side
of which again rose wooded hills. I ran down to the
end of the point and stood behind a small oak, while
Bishop and Dick walked down through the trees to drive
the turkey toward me. This time everything went well;
the turkey came out of the cover not too far off and
sprang into the air, heading across the valley and offer-
ing me a side shot at forty yards as he sailed by. It was
just the distance for the close-shooting ten-bore duck
gun I carried; and at the report down came the turkey
in a heap, not so much as a leg or wing moving. It was
an easy shot. But we had hunted hard for three days;
and the turkey is the king of American game birds ; and,
besides, I knew he would be very good eating indeed
when we brought him home; so I was as pleased as pos-
sible when Dick lifted the fine young gobbler, his bronze
plumage iridescent in the light of the westering sun.
Formerly we could ride across country in any direc-
tion around Washington and almost as soon as we left
the beautiful, tree-shaded streets of the city we were
in the real country. But as Washington grows, it natu-
rally — and to me most regrettably — becomes less and
less like its former, glorified-village, self; and wire fenc-
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS 417
ing has destroyed our old cross-country rides. Fortu-
nately there are now many delightful bridle trails in
Rock Creek Park; and we have fixed up a number of
good jumps at suitable places — a stone wall, a water
jump, a bank w^ith a ditch, two or three posts-and-rails,
about four feet high, and some stiff brush hurdles, one
of five feet seven inches. The last, which is the only for-
midable jump was put up to please two sporting members
of the administration, Bacon and Meyer. Both of them
school their horses over it; and my two elder boys, and
Fitzhugh Lee, my cavalry aide, also school my horses
over it. On one of my horses, Roswell, I have gone over
it myself; and as I weigh two hundred pounds without
my saddle I think that the jump, with such a weight, in
cold blood, should be credited to Roswell for righteous-
ness. Roswell is a bay gelding; Audrey a black mare;
they are Virginia horses. In the spring of 1907 I had
photographs of them taken going over the various jumps.
Roswell is a fine jumper, and usually goes at his jumps
in a spirit of matter-of-fact enjoyment. But he now and
then shows queer kinks in his temper. On one of these
occasions he began by wishing to rush his jumps, and
by trying to go over the wings instead of the jumps them-
selves. He fought hard for his head; and as it happened
that the best picture we got of him in the air was at this
particular time, it gives a wrong idea of his ordinary
behavior, and also, I sincerely trust, a wrong idea of my
hands. Generally he takes his jumps like a gentleman.
Many of the men with whom I hunted or with whom
I was brought in close contact when I lived on my ranch.
41 8 AN AMERICAN HUNTER
and still more of the men who were with me in the Rough
Riders, have shared in some way or other in my later
political life. Phil Stewart was one of the Presidential
Electors who in 1904 gave me Colorado's vote; Merri-
field filled the same position in Montana and is now Mar-
shal of that State. Cecil Lyon and Sloan Simpson, of
Texas, were delegates for me at the National Convention
which nominated me in 1904. Sewell is Collector of Cus-
toms in Maine; Sylvans and Joe Ferris are respectively
Register of the Land Office and Postmaster in North
Dakota; Dennis Shea with whom I worked on the Little
Missouri roundup holds my commission as Marshal of
North Dakota. Abernathy the wolf hunter is my Mar-
shal in Oklahoma. John Willis declined to take any
place ; when he was last my guest at the White House he
told me, I am happy to say, that he does better with his
ranch than he could have done with any office. Johnny
Gofif is a forest ranger near the Yellowstone Park. Seth
Bullock is Marshal of South Dakota; he too is an old
friend of my ranch days and was sheriff in the Black
Hills when I was deputy sheriff due north of him in
Billings County, in the then Territory of Dakota.
Among the people that we both arrested, by the way, was
a young man named " Calamity Joe," a very well-mean-
ing fellow but a wild boy who had gone astray, as wild
boys often used to go astray on the frontier, through bad
companionship. To my great amusement his uncle
turned up as United States Senator some fifteen years
later, and was one of my staunch allies. Of the men of
the regiment Lieutenant Colonel Brodie I made Gov-
ROSWELL FIGHTS FOR HIS HEAD
From a photograph, copyright, 1907, by Clinedinst
SMALL COUNTRY NEIGHBORS 419
ernor of Arizona, Captain Frantz, Governor of Okla-
homa, and Captain Curry Governor of New Mexico.
Ben Daniels I appointed Marshal of Arizona; Colbert,
the Chickasaw, Marshal in the Indian Territory. Llew-
ellyn is District Attorney in New Mexico. Jenkins is
Collector of Internal Revenue in South Carolina. Fred
Herrig, who was with me on the Little Missouri, where
we hunted the black-tail and the big-horn together, and
who later served under me at Santiago, is a forest ranger
in Montana; and many other men of my old regiment
have taken up with unexpected interest occupations as
diverse as those of postmaster, of revenue agent, of land
and forest officers of various kinds. Joe Lee is Minis-
ter to Ecuador; John Mcllhenny is Civil Service Com-
missioner; Craig Wadsworth is Secretary of Legation at
the Court of St. James; Mason Mitchell is Consul in
China, having already been Consul at Mozambique,
where he spent his holidays in hunting the biggest of
the world's big game.
Appointments to public office must of course be made
primarily because of the presumable fitness of the man
for the position. But even the most rigid moralist ought
to pardon the occasional inclusion of other considerations.
I am glad that I have been able to put in office certain
out-door men who were typical leaders in the old life of
the frontier, the daring adventurous life of warfare
against wild man and wild nature which has now so
nearly passed away. Bat Masterson, formerly of Dodge
City and the Texas cattle trail, the most famous of the old-
time marshals, the iron-nerved gun-fighters of the bor-
420
AN AMERICAN HUNTER
der, is now a deputy marshal in New York, under District
Attorney Stimson — himself a big game hunter, by the
way. Pat Garret, who slew Billy the Kid, I made Col-
lector of Customs at El Paso; and other scarred gun-
fighters of the vanished frontier, with to their credit deeds
of prowess as great as those of either Masterson or Garret,
now hold my commissions, on the Rio Grande, in the
Territories, or here and there in the States of the Rocky
Mountains and the Great Plains.
1908
y
