THE WHITETAIL DEER. 6l 



steep a hillside. Once after "a three days' 

 rainstorm some of us tried to get the ranch 

 wagon along a trail which led over the ridge 

 of a gumbo or clay butt^. The sticky stuff 

 clogged our shoes, the horses' hoofs, and the 

 wheels ; and it was even more slippery than 

 it was sticky. Finally we struck a sloping 

 shoulder ; with great struggling, pulling, push- 

 ing, and shouting, we reached the middle of 

 it, and then, as one of my men remarked, 

 " the whole darned outfit slid into the coulie." 

 These hunting trips after deer or antelope 

 with the wagon usually take four or five days. 

 I always ride some tried hunting horse ; and 

 the wagon itself when on such a hunt is apt 

 to lead a chequered career, as half the time 

 there is not the vestige of a trail to follow. 

 Moreover we often make a hunt when the 

 good horses are on the round-up, or otherwise 

 employed, and we have to get together a scrub 

 team of cripples or else of outlaws vicious 

 devils, only used from dire need. The best 

 teamster for such a hunt that we ever had on 

 the ranch was a weather-beaten old fellow 

 known as " Old Man Tompkins." In the 

 course of a long career as lumberman, plains 

 teamster, buffalo hunter, and Indian fighter, 

 he had passed several years as a Rocky 

 Mountain stage driver; and a stage driver of 

 the Rockies is of necessity a man of such skill 

 and nerve that he fears no team and no coun- 

 try. No matter how wild the unbroken horses, 

 Old Tompkins never asked help ; and he 

 hated to drive less than a four-in-hand. When 

 he once had a grip on the reins, he let no one 

 hold the horses' heads. All he wished was 



