n6 The Wilderness Hunter. 



well to one side of a cluster of high, bare peaks, and then 

 to cross them and come back to camp ; we reckoned that 

 the trip would take three days. 



All the first day we tramped through dense woods and 

 across and around steep mountain spurs. We caught 

 glimpses of two or three deer and a couple of elk, all does 

 or fawns, however, which we made no effort to molest. 

 Late in the afternoon we stumbled across a family of 

 spruce grouse, which furnished us material for both sup- 

 per and breakfast. The mountain men call this bird the 

 fool-hen ; and most certainly it deserves the name. The 

 members of this particular flock, consisting of a hen and 

 her three-parts grown chickens, acted with a stupidity 

 unwonted even for their kind. They were feeding on the 

 ground among some young spruce, and on our approach 

 flew up and perched in the branches four or five feet above 

 our heads. There they stayed, uttering a low, complaining 

 whistle, and showed not the slightest suspicion when we 

 came underneath them with long sticks and knocked four 

 off their perches for we did not wish to alarm any large 

 game that might be in the neighborhood by firing. One 

 particular bird was partially saved from my first blow by 

 the intervening twigs ; however, it merely flew a few yards, 

 and then sat with its bill open, having evidently been a 

 little hurt, until I came up and knocked it over with a 

 better directed stroke. 



Spruce grouse are plentiful in the mountain forests of 

 the northern Rockies, and, owing to the ease with which 

 they are killed, they have furnished me my usual provender 

 when off on trips of this kind, where I carried no pack. 



