The Last of the Plainsmen 



At this juncture, I noiselessly projected my rifle 

 barrel over the log. I had not, however, gotten the 

 sights in line with him, when he trotted away reluc 

 tantly, and ascended the knoll on his side of the 

 hollow. I lost him, and had just begun sourly to 

 call myself a mollycoddle hunter, when he reap 

 peared. He halted in an open glade, on the very 

 crest of the knoll, and stood still as a statue wolf, a 

 white, inspiriting target, against a dark green back 

 ground. I could not stifle a rush of feeling, for I 

 was a lover of the beautiful first, and a hunter sec 

 ondly; but I steadied down as the front sight moved 

 into the notch through which I saw the black and 

 white of his shoulder. 



Spang! How the little Remington sang! I 

 watched closely, ready to send five more missiles after 

 the gray beast. He jumped spasmodically, in a half- 

 curve, high in the air, with loosely hanging head, 

 then dropped in a heap. I yelled like a boy, ran down 

 the hill, up the other side of the hollow, to find him 

 stretched out dead, a small hole in his shoulder where 

 the bullet had entered, a great one where it had come 

 out. 



The job I made of skinning him lacked some hun 

 dred degrees the perfection of my shot, but I accom 

 plished it, and returned to camp in triumph. 



&quot; Shore I knowed you d plunk him,&quot; said Jim, 



248 



