r>OE, MUSK AND SIKA. 9 



A party of us were travelling through Shensi, and had reached 

 a belt of wild country south of Yen-an Fu, where the once cultivated 

 terraces had gone back to wilderness. Here roedeer and small game 

 were extremely plentiful, while there were not wanting signs of wild 

 boar, wolves and even panthers. Akeady the members of the party 

 had had splendid sport, seven deer having been accounted for in two 

 days. On the third day two of us were riding behind the caravan, 

 which was winding along the top of a high ridge, when we saw a 

 roedeer quietly feeding in a deep vallej' on our left. As we would 

 soon be out of the wild country, and both wished to add another deer 

 to our bag, we decided to go after this one. Accordingly we turned 

 off the road, and tying our ponies in a thicket, we crept do^^ii a water 

 cut, keeping well out of sight of our quarry. Jimmy, my pointer, in- 

 sisted on following, and dutifully kept close at my heels. Without 

 much difficulty we reached the shoulder of a ridge, which we had to 

 cross. Now we had to exercise the utmost care, for the bare slope 

 was in full view of the deer. Good luck was with us, for during our 

 passage the deer did not raise its head once, and soon we dropped 

 silently down into the fall brush' of the valley. It was all I could do 

 with fiercely whispered injunctions to keep Jimmy from dashing off, 

 for he, too, had spotted the deer. Each step brought us nearer to our 

 quan-y, which we glimpsed now and then through gaps in the under- 

 brush. Twice we found ourselves up to our armpits in deep snow 

 drifts. At last, after crossing a bare terrace flat upon our bellies, we 

 arrived' at a low hedge which I had noted as being within twenty yards 

 of the deer, and I gave the sign to my companion to be ready. As 

 we cleared the sheltering scrub up boimded the deer from almost 

 imder our feet. Bang ! bang ! went our rifles, and the buck sprang 

 into the air, turned a somersault and lay dead. On the instant an- 

 other buck broke cover, and again our rifles rang out. It staggered, 

 but recovered itself and was crashing away through the bushes whpu 

 Jimmy, unable to restrain himself another moment, sprang forward. 

 With a few bounds he overtook the wounded deer and springing for 

 its throat brought it do\^Ti headlong in the snow. 



A method of hunting the roedeer, which has been tried with great 

 success by one local sportsman in the forests of West Shansi, is that 

 adopted in the Phillipines and elsewhere where the jungle or forests 

 are too dense for open stalkinjr. This is with the use of a flash lantern, 

 fastened in the cap or on the right wrist, so that the beam of light is 

 directed forward along the rifle barrel. This method can only be 

 used at night, when any deer within two hundred yards, looking to- 

 wards the light betrays its presence by the bright rejection from the 



