20 ADVENTURES IN THE WILDERNESS. 



and I have known parties to be "starved out/' 

 where other men, with better guides, were meeting 

 with royal success. With a guide who under- 

 stands his business, I would undertake to feed a 

 party of twenty persons the season through, and 

 seldom should they sit down to a meal lacking 

 either trout or venison. I passed six weeks on 

 the Eacquette last summer, and never, save at one 

 meal, failed to see both of the two delicious arti- 

 cles of diet on my table. Generally speaking, no 

 inconvenience is experienced in this direction. 

 Always observing the rule, not to kill more than 

 the camp can eat, which a true sportsman never 

 transgresses, I have paddled past more deer 

 within easy range than I ever lifted my rifle at. 

 The same is true in reference to trout. I have 

 unjointed my rod when the water was alive with 

 leaping fish, and experienced more pleasure as I 

 sat and saw them rise for food or play, than any 

 thoughtless violator of God's laws could feel in 

 wasting the stores which Nature so bountifully 

 opens for our need. I am not in favor of " game 

 laws," passed for the most part in the interest of 

 the few and the rich, to the deprivation of the 

 poor and the many, but I would that fine and 

 imprisonment both might be the punishment of 

 him who, in defiance of every humane instinct 

 and reverential feeling, out of mere love for 

 "sport," as some are pleased to call it, directs a 



