342 SPORTING AD VENTURES IN THE FAR WEST. 



for the sport which promised so much buoyant, virile pleas- 

 ure. Our party was composed of five persons, including 

 an orderly, who had charge of half a dozen hounds, and a 

 French half-breed, who acted as guide. In the course of 

 half an hour after leaving camp we were in the midst of 

 a dense forest of those gigantic firs for which the North- 

 west is famous, and a few moments later the dogs were set 

 to work on a fresh trail. They soon gave tongue, and their 

 melodious tones rang through the silent woods with a clear- 

 ness I had never before heard equalled. This was the sig- 

 nal for a scurrying race to get to some convenient points 

 in order to have a shot. The guide placed me on a prom- 

 ising run-way, and I had scarcely taken my position ere a 

 magnificent black-tailed stag (C. columbianus) broke cover 

 not twenty paces from me. His head was high in the air, 

 and his antlers were thrown back, so that he appeared in his 

 most majestic mien. I gave him a low whistle ; he halted 

 to learn its import, and ere he could decide upon moving 

 I planted a load of buckshot in his neck and shoulders. 

 Before I could give him the second barrel he was bound- 

 ing through the shrubbery with those long, high jumps for 

 which he is noted, and the last I saw of him was an erect 

 cauda clearing the branches of a fallen tree. I was of 

 course much piqued at my bad shooting, and still more so 

 when I was rejoined by my companions, who commenced 

 chaffing me most unmercifully, and predicted that we should 

 have no luck that day, as I had missed the first deer. The 

 feeling of chagrin was bad enough ; but to be taunted 

 good-naturedly with spoiling the day's amusement was the 

 acme of depressing pride. I insisted that I had wounded 

 the animal so seriously that it could not run very far ; but 

 this only elicited a sarcastic laugh, and the query if I did 

 not think I ought to challenge certain redoubted hunters 

 to engage in a week's contest to test superiority. My vic- 

 tory soon came, however; for the guide, who was sound- 

 ing a mellow cow's horn to recall the pack, reported that 

 they must have overtaken the quarry, or they would have 

 returned in answer to his peremptory summons. This in- 



