54 THE WILDERNESS HUNTER. 



house, there is a long succession of heavily 

 wooded bottoms ; and on all of these, even 

 on the one whereon the house itself stands, 

 there are a good many whitetail yet left. 



When we take a day's regular hunt we usu- 

 ally wander afar, either to the hills after black- 

 tail or to the open prairie after antelope. But 

 if we are short of meat, and yet have no time 

 for a regular hunt, being perhaps able to spare 

 only a couple of hours after the day's work is 

 over, then all hands turn out to drive a bottom 

 for whitetail. We usually have one or two 

 trackhounds at the ranch ; true southern deer- 

 hounds, black and tan, with lop ears and 

 hanging lips, their wrinkled faces stamped 

 with an expression of almost ludicrous mel- 

 ancholy. They are not fast, and have none 

 of the alert look of the pied and spotted 

 modern foxhound ; but their noses are very 

 keen, their voices deep and mellow, and they 

 are wonderfully staunch on a trail. 



All is bustle and laughter as we start on 

 such a hunt. The baying hounds bouncl 

 about, as the rifles are taken down ; the wiry 

 ponies are roped out of the corral, and each 

 broad-hatted hunter swings joyfully into the 

 saddle. If the pony bucks or "acts mean" 

 the rider finds that his rifle adds a new ele- 

 ment of interest to the performance, which is 

 of course hailed with loud delight by all the 

 men on quiet horses. Then we splash off over 

 the river, scramble across the faces of the 

 bluffs, or canter along the winding cattle paths, 

 through the woods, until we come to the bot- 

 tom we intend to hunt. Here a hunter is 

 stationed at each runway along which it is 



