American Big-Game Hunting 
curious stories of such accidents are told by 
the few surviving old-timers whose memory 
goes back fifty years, to the time when flint- 
lock guns were in use. A mere fall from 
a horse is lightly regarded by the practised 
rider; the danger to be feared is that in such 
a fall the horse may roll on the man and 
crush him. Even more serious accidents 
occurred when a man fell upon some part 
of his equipment, which was driven through 
his body. Hunters have fallen in such a way 
that their whip-stocks, arrows, bows, and even 
guns, have been driven through their bodies. 
The old flint-lock guns, or “fukes,” which 
were loaded on the run, with powder poured 
in from the horn by guess, and a ball from 
the mouth, used frequently to burst, causing 
the loss of hands, arms, and even lives. 
While most of the deaths which occurred 
in the chase resulted from causes other than 
the resistance of the buffalo, these did oc- 
casionally kill a man. A curious accident 
happened in a camp of Red River half-breeds 
in the early seventies. The son of an Iroquois 
half-breed, about twenty years old, went out 
one day with the rest of the camp to run 
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