THE ALUMNI JOURNAL 37 



HUNTING IN HONDURAS. 



By William Pruss, Ph. G., '04. 



In the month of August of the past year I set out accompanied 

 b\' my brother Captain F. Pruss on a hunting trip to Honduras. 



Long before the date of our departure I had pictured to myself 

 the reaHsm of the pleasures and strenuosity of such a trip, but 

 vivid indeed as were those mental sketches they were very far from 

 being exaggerated when the reality was encountered. 



It seldom happens that the common variety of drug clerk can 

 boast of an unerring aim and fearless recklessness. 



I am a hardworking member of the drug-clerk fraternity having 

 a goodly knowledge as to the making up of the most abstruse per- 

 scription, but having little or no intimacy with the loading and 

 intricate working of a Winchester repeating ritie. and yet when the 

 story of my hunting trip comes to be written and read, it will be 

 found that upon the memorable and strenuous hunting trip, I took 

 my share of dangers and fortunes of the day in a manner that re- 

 flects some credit at all events on myself and my old Alma Mater. 

 I say this in no spirit of boastfulness, but simply as a plain state- 

 ment of facts. 



After a pleasant voyage from New York on the good ship Carit 

 2, we reached the old fortified seaport of Truxillo in Honduras. 



My vacation being limited and the hours at my disposal being 

 consequently limited we set out, after partaking of a little refresh- 

 ment and the enjoyment of a pipeful or two, by an overland route 

 to Ceiba — an ancient city surrounded by high mountains and dense 

 impenetrable forests. 



We rested in Ceiba for two days making final preparations for 

 our trip and enjoying the sights of the old Spanish-Mexican City — 

 wondering at the customs and manners of its dark skinned bright- 

 eyed inhabitants — all so strange and so un-American to us. 



On the third day we set out on our trip. 



I should have stated that the mountains and forests surrounding 

 Ceiba afiford shelter and cover for large herds of wild cattle and 

 deer. Hundreds upon hundreds of wild cats and leopards are 

 found there also, and the dare-devil sport afforded in the hunting 

 of the latter has been the loadstone that atracted many a hardy 

 hunter to Ceiba — an attraction which, by the way, meant death to 

 manv a reckless adA'enturer. 



