62 The Wilderness Hunter. 



antelope scattered across the prairie, singly, in couples, or 

 in bands. But their very numbers, joined to the lack of 

 cover on such an open, flattish country, proved a bar to 

 success ; while I was stalking one band another was sure 

 to see me and begin running, whereat the first would like- 

 wise start ; I missed one or two very long shots, and noon 

 found me still without game. 



However, I was then lucky enough to see a band of a 

 dozen feeding to windward of a small butte, and by gal- 

 loping in a long circle I got within a quarter of a mile of 

 them before having to dismount. The stalk itself was 

 almost too easy ; for I simply walked to the butte, climbed 

 carefully up a slope where the soil was firm and peered over 

 the top to see the herd, a little one, a hundred yards off. 

 They saw me at once and ran, but I held well ahead of a 

 fine young prong-buck, and rolled him over like a rabbit, 

 with both shoulders broken. In a few minutes I was 

 riding onwards once more with the buck lashed behind my 

 saddle. 



The next one I got, a couple of hours later, offered a 

 much more puzzling stalk. He was a big fellow in com- 

 pany with four does or small bucks. All five were lying 

 in the middle of a slight basin, at the head of a gentle val- 

 ley. At first sight it seemed impossible to get near them, 

 for there was not so much cover as a sage brush, and the 

 smooth, shallow basin in which they lay was over a thou- 

 sand yards across, while they were looking directly down 

 the valley. However, it is curious how hard it is to tell, 

 even from nearby, whether a stalk can or cannot be 

 made ; the difficulty being to estimate the exact amount 



