THE DEER FAMILY 41 



does not see as well as the antelope. However this may 

 be, he certainly sees well enough to get out of the way 

 quickly when he has been much hunted, and I would 

 not advise a sportsman anywhere to rcl}- upon the 

 deer's defect of vision. Grinnell is no doubt rig-ht in 

 what he says about this matter in his paper, "The 

 North American Cervid^." " It is true," he says, " that 

 deer will pass close by a man sitting in the woods 

 without seeing him, provided only he remains per- 

 fectly motionless ; but this does not necessarily imply 

 an}^ imperfection of vision. Other mammals and birds 

 will do precisely the same thing. The deer would not 

 walk up to a man standing or sitting in the middle of a 

 meadow, where there were no surrounding objects. 

 A man, if motionless in the woods when clothed in 

 hunter's garb, very closely resembles a stump or stick." 

 I was once sitting upon a rock in quite an exposed 

 place on top of a mountain in Wyoming when a mule- 

 deer alarmed by m}^ companion in the woods slowly 

 came out into the open and walked within a few feet 

 of me. He did not see me until I turned to shoot, 

 when he went off at his best gait. The hawk is pro- 

 verbial for his keenness of sight, but I heard of one actu- 

 ally alighting upon the head of a punter who was sit- 

 ting in a marsh watching the ducks. The punter was 

 wearing a canvas coat, of a marsh-grass color, and an 

 old gray cap ; and the hawk, approaching from be- 

 hind, no doubt mistook him for a stump, dropped on 

 his head, and there remained until the punter raised 

 his hand and turned to see what had touched him. 

 He told me he thought his companion had approached 

 and struck him with his hand, until he saw the hawk 



