Memories of a Bear Hunter 



fourths of a mile, we cautiously approached the 

 place where the elk had been. Three antelope 

 stood officiously near that point and seemed to 

 dare us to fire at them, but we were in search of 

 larger game. 



Some of the elk had moved down the ridge and 

 they had scattered out, but we discovered it in time 

 not to alarm them, and crept up to within a hun- 

 dred and fifty yards. Each selecting his animal, 

 we fired. Mine fell, but Catlin overshot, and the 

 noise started them running. We ran down the 

 mountain, and each got another shot at a hundred 

 and fifty yards, mine again falling by a shot 

 through the shoulder, and Catlin missing. Look- 

 ing across the valley of a small creek, a band of 

 at least fifty elk that our shots had alarmed 

 streamed out of the valley, and a mile further on, 

 over near the base of the mountain, was a still 

 larger band of seventy or eighty. These joined 

 the others, and all went off. I had never before 

 seen so many elk, and those I saw would ordinarily 

 be estimated as three or four hundred, but my esti- 

 mate is based on a count of portions of the herd. 



On examining our game, we found that both 

 were cows, and neither fat. They were shot with 

 275-grain hollow bullets, with a hole one-sixteenth 

 of an inch in diameter. The first one was shot 



"3 



