104 NOTES FROM THE PRAIRIE 



setting the eggs under the tame hens, but it 

 cannot be done; they seem to inherit a shyness 

 that makes them refuse to eat, and at the first 

 opportunity they slip off in the grass and are 

 gone. Every kind of food, even to live in- 

 sects, they will refuse, and will starve to death 

 rather than eat in captivity. There are but 

 few chickens here now; they have taken Hor- 

 ace Greeley's advice and gone West. As to 

 four-footed game, there were any number of 

 the little prairie-wolves and some big gray 

 ones. Could see the little wolves running 

 across the prairie any time a day, and at night 

 their continual yap^ yap was almost unendur- 

 able. They developed a taste for barn-yard 

 fowl that made it necessary for hens to roost 

 high. They are cowards in the daytime, but 

 brave enough to come close to the house at 

 night. If people had only had foxhounds, 

 they would have afforded an opportunity for 

 some sport. I have seen people try to run 

 them down on horseback, but never knew them 

 to succeed. 



"One of my standard amusements was to go 

 every little while to a den the wolves had, 

 where the rocks cropped out of the ground, and 

 poke in there with a stick, to see a wolf pop 

 out scared almost to death. As to the big 

 wolves, it was dangerous sport to meddle with 

 them. I had an experience with them one 

 winter that would have begotten a desire to 

 keep a proper distance from them, had I not 

 felt it before. An intensely cold night three 



