THE WILSON QUARTERLY. 5 



"signs" of deer and Other large game. On my first visit 

 there I wanted skins of a few dozen Gambel's, and I enter- 

 tained the notion that No. 8 shot were the proper size to 

 kill them with. I had but few of them with me. and to 

 make them go as far as possible, shot the birds on the 

 ground, in the open spaces between the bushes, where 

 I could get from two to five at each discharge. "Not 

 sportsman like," you say ? Well, it was specimens I was 

 there for. Besides, I do not like to carry too great a weight 

 of cartridges, or to hunt birds out of the almost impenetra- 

 ble chaparral when dropped one at a time on the wing. 

 Time also seems too valuable when there are so many rare 

 specimens about. After using all of my No. 8 shot and 

 three charges of No 12, I tried fine dust shot and found 

 that at 2o to 30 yards I could kill as well or even better, 

 than with larger sizes. Firing at a group of three to five, 

 someway the little shot would find the heads of every one 

 of them and kill them stone dead. It seemed to me that j 

 could have killed a thousand in a day. 



Doves were so numierous that one could shoot all the time, 

 at pairs or groups of several birds. I could have killed more 

 rabbits in a short time than I could carry. How the coun- 

 try furnished food for so much animal life was to me a 

 mystery. I was told of a party that trapped 24,000 quail for 

 the San Francisco market ; thousands were shot, for their 

 use, by people along the valley, while the R. R. eating-house 

 was constantly supplied. This was on my first visit. The 

 next winter a terrible flood swept over the whole valley, 

 washing it out in places and covering it with rubbish and 

 sediment in others. On my last visit game did not seem so 

 abundant, though there was enough, and one could shoot 

 more than he needed in a short time. Eggs of quail could 

 be found easily, and I have found several fine sets in a day 

 without looking for them. At this season all were fresh, 

 though I saw one bird five miles out on the desert, with a 

 flock of young the size of small chickens. 



On my first afternoon's shooting here, I started a 

 covey of Gambel's Partridges which flew into a mesquite 



