276 Hunting the Grisly 



offered any protection, each man crept out 

 to a point of the triangular brush patch and 

 lay down to await events. 



In a very short while the Indians began 

 closing in on them, taking every advantage of 

 cover, and then, both from their side of the 

 river and from the opposite bank, opened a 

 perfect fusillade, wasting their cartridges with 

 a recklessness which Indians are apt to show 

 when excited. The hunters could hear the 

 hoarse commands of the chiefs, the war- 

 whoops and the taunts in broken English 

 which some of the warriors hurled at them. 

 Very soon all of their horses were killed, and 

 the brush was fairly riddled by the incessant 

 volleys; but the three men themselves, lying 

 flat on the ground and well concealed, were 

 not harmed. The more daring young war- 

 riors then began to creep toward the hunters, 

 going stealthily from one piece of cover to 

 the next; and now the whites in turn opened 

 fire. They did not shoot recklessly, as did 

 their foes, but coolly and quietly, endeavor- 

 ing to make each shot tell. Said Woody: "I 

 only fired seven times all day; I reckoned on 

 getting meat every time I pulled trigger." 

 They had an immense advantage over their 

 enemies, in that whereas they lay still and 



