222 ACCESSIBLE FIELD SPORTS. 



by which they became adopted as fit inhabitants for 

 our parks and demesnes. 



In referring to my diary, I find the following nar- 

 rative of a day's shooting : 



" Cap., are you asleep ? " such was the welcome sound 

 that informed me that some one else was awake besides 

 myself. Such a night I do not think I had ever pre- 

 viously passed, and trust shall never have to again. 

 To ask a man nurtured in a Christian land whether he 

 was asleep ! the thing is perfectly preposterous : a 

 gale of wind blowing the entire night, with drops of 

 rain as large and so numerous that a brick wall would 

 scarcely have repelled them, let alone a flimsy break- 

 wind composed of green boughs, yet these western com- 

 panions of mine slept ! Half-a-dozen times I determined 

 to rout my companions out, and as often gave up the 

 idea ; for one was quarrelsome whenever his rest was 

 disturbed, the other had a disagreeable way of telling 

 the most doleful stories, and keeping the listeners in a 

 constant state of excitement, for in every shadow, 

 every movement of the horses, every unusual sound, he 

 saw an indication that a whole tribe of Indians, fully 

 decked with war-paint, and thirsting for scalps, were 

 about to make an onslaught on our defenceless bivouac. 

 Further, I must inform my readers that Cap. is an 

 abbreviation of captain, used all over the western por- 



