IN THE BIG HORN MOUNTAINS. Ill 



other mules that morning, and so these were the only casual- 

 ties. We led the erring brother back onto the high and 

 narrow way, adjusted his burden upon his willing back, and 

 once more slowly wended our weary way toward the goal. 



We camped near a fine spring that night, on the same 

 plateau and only a few miles from the scene of our former 

 night's camp. All night we could hear elk whistling around 

 our camp. They wanted to come to the spring for water, but 

 the sight of our white canvas, our mules, etc., kept them back. 

 Along toward morning I saw one large bull standing on the 

 top of a ridge about seventy-five or eighty yards away. 

 There was no moon at that hour, but the stars shone brightly, 

 and his majestic form was plainly visible by their light. I 

 crawled out of bed, took my rifle, and started to crawl up 

 toward him, but he saw or heard me, and vanished into thin 

 air before I could get near enough for a sure shot. 



We were up at 5 o'clock A.M., had an early breakfast, and 

 moved at six. After we had gone about half a mile from 

 camp, we looked back and saw a small band of elk coming 

 over a ridge away to the southwest, heading directly for the 

 spring we had just left. Huffman and I dismounted, left 

 Conley in charge of the mules, and ran down into a coulee 

 out of sight. Then began a long, tedious, laborious still 

 hunt. The elk were on higher ground than we, and were 

 moving, slowly, cautiously, warily toward us, stopping at 

 frequent intervals to scan the ground and sniff the air in 

 search of danger. We had a broad expanse of level prairie 

 to pass over yet before reaching the cover of the brush, and 

 we knew that in order to get a shot we must needs be in the 

 thicket before the elk got there. To get over this open 

 prairie without letting the game discover us was an under- 

 taking of no small magnitude. We laid down and crawled 

 through the grass a distance of a hundred yards or more to a 



