DEER- STALKING. 105 



'' Abe, have you e'er a shooting-iron that you can loan this 

 coon ? " 



Abe having replied in the negative, and inquired the 

 reason, was told that the most alfiatest big buck had 

 crossed the road about a mile off, and gone into the 

 Squire's corn. Quietly going to my bed-room, I unpacked 

 my heaviest gun, a ten-bore, in which I have particular 

 faith, and having noted the route that the teamster had 

 come by, I followed the back track of his sled, and true 

 enough found the prints of a very heavy buck. The day 

 was still young, myself in good walking trim, and with an 

 internal determination not to be beaten, except night 

 overtook me, and very probably with the hope to show the 

 neighbours that a Britisher was good for some purposes, I 

 followed the track with unusually willing steps and light 

 heart. To get into the corn-fields the buck had jumped 

 the snake fence and afterwards doubled back, and as the 

 wind did not suit for me to enter at the same place, I made 

 a considerable detour. In my right barrel I had sixteen 

 buck shot, about the size that would run one hundred to 

 the pound, and a bullet in the left. As the corn had not 

 yet been gathered, and the undergrowth of cuckle burs and 

 other weeds was tolerably dense, I had little doubt but that 

 I should get sufficiently close to make use of the former. 

 An old stager like my quarry, I knew from experience 

 would be desperately sharp, so with the utmost caution I 

 advanced up wind, eyes and ears strained to the utmost 

 tension. I had only got about a fourth of the field 

 traversed, when 1 heard some voices right to windward 

 encouraging a dog to hold a pig. The noise of the men, 



