308 Hunting Trips on the Prairie 



dition to our bill of fare, the meat being white and 

 excellent. A curious peculiarity in their flesh is 

 that the breast meat has in it a layer of much darker 

 color. They are very handsome birds, and furnish 

 dainty food to men wearied of venison; but, unless 

 their heads are knocked off with a rifle, they do not 

 furnish much sport, as they will not fly off when 

 flushed, but simply rise into a fairly tall tree, and 

 there sit, motionless, except that the head is twisted 

 and bobbed round to observe the acts of the foe. 



All of the sights and sounds in these pine woods 

 that clothed the Bighorn Mountains reminded me 

 of the similar ones seen and heard in the great, 

 sombre forests of Maine and the Adirondacks. 

 The animals and birds were much the same. As 

 in the East, there were red squirrels, chipmunks, 

 red hares, and woodchucks, all of them differing 

 but slightly from our common kinds; woodpeck- 

 ers, chickadees, nuthatches, and whiskey-jacks came 

 about camp; ravens and eagles flew over the rocky 

 cliffs. There were some new forms, however. 

 The nutcracker, a large, noisy, crow-like bird, with 

 many of the habits of a woodpecker, was common, 

 and in the rocks above timber line, we came upon 

 the Little Chief hare, a wee animal, with a shrill, 

 timorous squeak. 



During our stay upon the mountains the weather 

 was generally clear, but always cold, thin ice cov- 

 ering the dark waters of the small mountain tarns, 

 and there were slight snow-falls every two or three 

 days ; but we were only kept in camp one day, when 



