OF A RANCHMAN 295 



odds are greatly against his hitting. I sup- 

 pose I had fired a dozen times at animals four 

 or five him irds off, and now, by the 



doctrine of chances, 1 happened to hit; but 

 I would have been very foolish if I had 

 thought for a moment that I had learned how 

 to hit at over four hundred yards. I have 

 yet to see the hunter who can hit with any 

 regularity at that distance, when he has to 

 judge it for himself; though I have seen 

 plenty who could make such a long range 

 hit now and then. And I have noticed that 

 such a hunter, in talking over his experience, 

 certain soon to forget the numerous 

 misses he made, and to say, and even to 

 actually think, that his occasional hits repre- 

 sented his average shooting. 



One of the finest black-tail bucks I ever 

 shot was killed while lying out in a rather 

 nal place. I was hunting mountain- 

 sheep, in a stretch of very high and broken 

 country, and about mid-day, crept cauti< 

 up to the edge of a great gorge, whose sheer 

 walls went straight down several hundred 



