THE POCKET HUNTER 



I REMEMBER very well when I first 

 met him. Walking in the evening glow 

 to spy the marriages of the white gilias, I 

 sniffed the unmistakable odor of burning 

 sage. It is a smell that carries far and indi- 

 cates usually the nearness of a campoodie, 

 but on the level mesa nothing taller showed 

 than Diana's sage. Over the tops of it, be- 

 ginning to dusk under a young white moon, 

 trailed a wavering ghost of smoke, and at 

 the end of it I came upon the Pocket 

 Hunter making a dry camp in the friendly 

 scrub. He sat tailorwise in the sand, with 

 his coffee-pot on the coals, his supper ready 

 to hand in the frying pan, and himself in a 

 mood for talk. His pack burros in hobbles 

 strayed off to hunt for a wetter mouthful 

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