216 THE WILDERNESS HUNTER, 



bull by a shot right through the heart, as it 

 trotted past, a hundred and fifty yards distant. 

 As for me, during the next ten days I killed 

 nothing save one cow for meat ; and this 

 though I hunted hard every clay from morn- 

 ing till night, no matter what the weather. It 

 was stormy, with hail and snow almost every 

 day; and after working hard from dawn until 

 nightfall, laboriously climbing the slippery 

 mountain-sides, walking through the wet 

 woods, and struggling across the bare plateaus 

 and cliff-shoulders, while the violent blasts 

 of wind drove the frozen rain in our faces, 

 we would come in after dusk wet through and 

 chilled to the marrow. Even when it rained in 

 the valleys it snowed on the mountain-tops, 

 and there was no use trying to keep our feet 

 dry. I got three shots at bull elk, two being 

 very hurried snap-shots at animals running in 

 thick timber, the other a running-shot in the 

 open, at over two hundred yards ; and I missed 

 all three. On most days I saw no bull worth 

 shooting ; the two or three I did see or hear 

 we failed to stalk, the light, shifty wind baf- 

 fling us, or else an outlying cow which we had 

 not seen giving the alarm. There were many 

 blue and a few ruffed grouse in the woods, 

 and I occasionally shot off the heads of a 

 couple on my way homeward in the evening. 

 In racing after one elk, I leaped across a gully 

 and so bruised and twisted my heel on a rock 

 that, for the remainder of my stay in the 

 mountains, I had to walk on the fore part of 

 that foot. This did not interfere much with 

 my walking, however, except in going down- 

 hill. 



