44 Hunting Trips of a Ranchman 



moreover, was alive, and likely to take to its heels 

 at any moment, the difficulty of making a good shot 

 would be greatly enhanced. The man who can kill 

 his buck right along at a hundred yards has a right 

 to claim that he is a good shot. If he can shoot off- 

 hand standing up, that is much the best way, but 

 I myself always drop on one knee, if I have time, 

 unless the animal is very close. It is curious to hear 

 the nonsense that is talked and to see the nonsense 

 that is written about the distances at which game is 

 killed. Rifles now carry with deadly effect the dis- 

 tance of a mile, and most middle-range hunting-rifles 

 would at least kill at half a mile; and in war firing 

 is often begun at these ranges. But in war there 

 is very little accurate aiming, and the fact that there 

 is a variation of thirty or forty feet in the flight of 

 the ball makes no difference ; and, finally, a thousand 

 bullets are fired for every man killed and usually 

 many more than a thousand. How would that serve 

 for a record on game ? The truth is that three hun- 

 dred yards is a very long shot, and that even two 

 hundred yards is a long shot. On looking over my 

 game-book I find that the average distance at which 

 I have killed game on the plains is less than a hun- 

 dred and fifty yards. A few years ago, when the 

 buffalo would stand still in great herds, half a mile 

 from the hunter, the latter, using a long-range 

 Sharps rifle, would often, by firing a number of 

 shots into the herd at that distance, knock over two 

 or three buffalo ; but I have hardly ever known sin- 

 gle animals to be killed six hundred yards off, even 



