Hunting in Many Lands 



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 be- 

 yond the picketed horses. The other three I 

 got after much maneuvering and long, tedious 

 stalks. 



In some of the stalks, after infinite labor, 

 and perhaps after crawling on all fours for an 

 hour, or pulling myself flat on my face among 

 some small sagebrush for ten or fifteen min- 

 utes, 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. 

 Once in the afternoon I had to spend so much 

 time waiting for the antelope to get into a fa- 

 vorable place that, when I got up close, I found 

 the light already so bad that my front sight 

 glimmered 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 at a long dis- 

 tance 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 crawl- 



294 



