748 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Sept. 



felt quite well acquainted indeed with its 

 author. Then she blew a tin horn, and her 

 husband dropped his work in the fields, and 

 came in. While we sat down to a good sub- 

 stantial farm dinner, he looked at me smil- 

 ingly, and remarked : " Well, I never ex- 

 pected it would be our good fortune to have 

 Mr. A. I. Root sit down with us at our ta- 

 ble." 



Of course, after this I felt perfectly free 

 to get acquainted, not only with the chil- 

 dren, but with the pack of hounds and the 

 puppies. Friend ('raven is a genius, and 

 liis special hobby is hunting, trapping, and 

 studying the habits of wild animals. In 

 Wisconsin a large bounty is offered for the 

 scalps of wolves, bears, etc., on account of 

 the damage they do to sheep and other farm 

 stock. Mr. Craven informed me that the 

 wolves some years ago destroyed fifty dol- 

 lars' worth of sheep in one night on that 

 very farm. The bounty paid for wolf-scalps 

 is something like this : Ten dollars for a 



THE WOLF THAT DIDN T WANT TO HAVE HIS 

 "PICTURE took." 



young wolf, and fifteen for a she-wolf. You 

 see, they pay extra for destroying the mother 

 of a lot of cubs. I want to say right here, 

 that friend France is also a celebrated wolf- 

 hunter. In one room of his building at 

 home he and his boys have fitted up about 

 as interesting a museum of stuffed wild an- 

 imals as we see at our colleges. 



After dinner we went into the front room, 

 and one of the curiosities on the table was 

 the skull of a bear, with a hole broken in at 

 one part of it. By the side of the skull lay 

 a hatchet, and friend Craven told me he kill- 

 ed that bear in a hand-to-hand encounter, 

 with no weapon but the hatchet. Friend C. 

 has a pack of thirteen hounds, to assist him 

 in hunting wolves and bears. In a pen near 

 by they had eight puppies just old enough 

 to be pretty and cunning. Inside of the lit- 

 tle building, or barn, was a young wolf 

 which the dogs had chased into a brush- 

 heap, if I remember correctly. But friend 



C. has the dogs so w r ell trained that he for- 

 bade any one of them biting the wolf at all, 

 and he went in and caught him and put a 

 collar around his neck. When we went in 

 to see the wolf, he turned his head one way 

 and then another, and even pushed it down 

 in one corner, out of sight, covering it with 

 his paws. He seemed to say by his actions, 

 " I do not want to see you at all. Flease go 

 off and let me alone." 1 And then he fairly 

 whined, because he felt so bashful, and so 

 much embarrased in the presence of stran- 

 gers. His master, however, pulled him out 

 of the corner by a chain, and made him 

 stand up and show himself. I told friend < '. 

 that, if he would get the wolf out into the 

 sunlight, I would take his picture with the 

 Kodak. For a long while he kept putting 

 his head down between his paws, or down 

 against the woodpile. But finally we got 

 him to look up; and while he was glaring 

 at me, and showing his teeth, I snapped the 

 key of the Kodak, and here is his picture. 

 I just wish you could have seen the 

 glare of his eyes as he showed his 

 teeth at me, as he thought I was go- 

 ing to shoot him, or possibly scare 

 the life out of him in some way or 

 other. 



Just as we were ready to start I 

 was greatly interested in seeing the 

 thirteen hounds jumping and caper- 

 ing around Mrs. Craven, who was 

 just going out into the yard with a 

 small-sized tub, or something of the 

 sort, in one hand. It was time to 

 give them their dinner, and I laugh- 

 ingly remarked that they were inter- 

 ested in their daily food about as 

 much as any of us. Mr. Craven, how- 

 ever, replied : 



li Friend Root, it would perhaps 

 surprise you if I should be able to 

 draw their attention to something 

 else so effectually that, hungry as 

 they are, their dinner would be for- 

 gotten and deserted in an instant.'' 



I replied that I could hardly see 

 how it were possible ; but he bade 

 me please watch him carefully. I 

 saw smiles on the faces of the rest 

 of the family. Well, what he did 

 was to slip into the house very quietly, 

 and presently return with his gun. He 

 kept the gun out of sight as much as possi- 

 ble, screening it by his body. But pretty 

 soon one of the grayhounds caught a 

 glimpse of it. In an instant it uttered a pe- 

 culiar call, or bay ; and as if by magic every 

 one of the beautiful animals left the food 

 and started after their master. He slowly 

 walked toward the gate, still keeping the 

 ri fie out of their sight ; but their eyes and 

 instincts were keen. The whole pack set 

 up a chorus of voices, and in their joy they 

 leaped and bounded around him as if they 

 would spring over his head. Some of them 

 bounded on as if to lead the way ; and 

 you never before, perhaps, witnessed such 

 rejoicing by a lot of dumb animals. All 

 this was just because they supposed he was 

 going out for a hunt. Ferhaps miles upon 

 miles of travel lay before them, so far as 

 they knew, and doubtless hours of time 



