202 HUNTING TRIPS 



wheeling was, in consequence, very heavy, 

 and after striking the Keogh trail, we were 

 able to go along it but a few miles before 

 the fagged-out look of the team and the ap- 

 proach of evening warned us that we should 

 have to go into camp while still a dozen 

 miles from any pool or spring. Accord- 

 ingly we made what would have been a dry 

 camp had it not been for the incessant 

 down-pour of rain, which we gathered in 

 the canvas wagon-sheet and in our oilskin 

 overcoats in sufficient quantity to make 

 coffee, having with infinite difficulty started 

 a smouldering fire just to leeward of the 

 wagon. The horses, feeding on the soaked 

 grass, did not need water. An antelope, 

 with the bold and heedless curiosity some- 

 times shown by its tribe, came up within 

 two hundred yards of us as we were build- 

 ing the fire; but though one of us took a 

 shot at him, it missed. Our shaps and oil- 

 skins had kept us perfectly dry, and as soon 

 as our frugal supper was over, we coiled up 



