72 The Wilderness Hunter 



ing sage brush. In the hot air all things seen afar 

 danced and wavered. As I rode and gazed at the 

 shimmering haze the vast desolation of the land- 

 scape bore on me, it seemed as if the unseen and. 

 unknown powers of the wastes were moving by and 

 marshaling their silent forces. No man save the 

 wilderness dweller knows the strong melancholy 

 fascination of these long rides through lonely lands. 

 At noon, that the horses might graze and drink, 

 I halted where some box-alders grew by a pool in 

 the bed of a half-dry creek; and shifted my saddle 

 to a fresh beast. When we started again we came 

 out on the rolling prairie, where the green sea of 

 wind-rippled grass stretched limitless as far as the 

 eye could reach. Little striped gophers scuttled 

 away, or stood perfectly straight at the mouths of 

 their burrows, looking like picket pins. Curlews 

 clamored mournfully as they circled overhead. 

 Prairie fowl swept off, clucking and calling, or 

 strutted about with their sharp tails erect. Antelope 

 were very plentiful, running like race-horses across 

 the level, or uttering their queer, barking grunt as 

 they stood at gaze, the white hairs on their rumps 

 all on end, their neck bands of broken brown and 

 white vivid in the sunlight. They were found sin- 

 gly or in small straggling parties ; the master bucks 

 had not yet begun to drive out the younger and 

 weaker ones as later in the season, when each would 

 gather into a herd as many does as his jealous 



