56 Deer and Antelope of North America 



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 for- 

 ward, 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 

 white-tail is by any means as keen-sighted as the 

 prong-horn 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 comparison. A motionless object does 

 not attract a deer's gaze as it attracts the tele- 

 scopic eye of a prongbuck ; but any motion is 

 seen at once, and as soon as this has occurred, 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. 



