38 LIFE IN THE FAR WEST. 



of jumps or preparatory kicks, and looked wicked as a 

 panther. When nothing but the fore pack-saddle remained, 

 she had worked herself into the last stage; and as the 

 stranger cast loose the girth of buffalo-hide, and was about 

 to lift the saddle and draw the crupper from the tail, she 

 drew her hind legs under her, more tightly compressed her 

 tail, and almost shrieked with rage. 



" Stand clear," he roared (knowing what was coming), 

 and raised the saddle, when out went her hind legs, up 

 went the pack into the air, and, with it dangling at her 

 heels, away she tore, kicking the offending saddle as she 

 ran. Her master, however, took this as matter of course, 

 followed her and brought back the saddle, which he piled 

 on the others to windward of the fire one of the trappers 

 was kindling. Fire-making is a simple process with the 

 mountaineers. Their bullet-pouches always contain a flint 

 and steel, and sundry pieces of " punk " * or tinder ; and 

 pulling a handful of dry grass, which they screw into a 

 nest, they place the lighted punk in this, and, closing the 

 grass over it, wave it in the air, when it soon ignites, and 

 readily kindles the dry sticks forming the foundation of 

 the fire. 



The titbits of the deer the stranger had brought in were 

 soon roasting over the fire ; whilst, as soon as the burning 

 logs had deposited a sufficiency of ashes, a hole was raked 

 in them, and the head of the deer, skin, hair, and all, 

 placed in this primitive oven, and carefully covered with 

 the hot ashes. 



A " heap " of " fat meat " in perspective, our mountain- 

 eers enjoyed their anteprandial pipes, recounting the news 

 of the respective regions whence they came ; and so well 

 did they like each other's company, so sweet was the "honey- 

 dew " tobacco of which the strange hunter had good store, 

 so plentiful the game about the creek, and so abundant 

 the pasture for their winter-starved animals, that before 

 the carcass of the " two-year " buck had been more than 

 four-fifths consumed and although nb after rib had been 



* A pithy substance found in dead pine-trees. 



