CHAPTER XXXV. 

 A Day of Luck. 



VERY hunter of long experience could tell of the ups and 

 downs along the trail consisting of good, bad and indiffer- 

 ent luck and as usual tell of our hits and let others tell 

 of our misses, I will tell of a day of good luck. It was in 

 November and there was no snow on the ground. I was camping 

 on the Holman branch of Pine Creek in Pennsylvania and one 

 night, just at dark, a party of several men came to my camp and 

 asked to stay over night. They stated that they were going to 

 camp on the opposite side of the ridge on the Sinnamahoning 

 waters. My camp was small but I made room for the hunters 

 the best I could. 



This party was going into a section of country where I had 

 several bear traps as well as a good number of smaller traps set 

 for fox, mink, marten and other fur animals. As I wished to 

 look these traps over the next day before this party got scattered 

 about the woods where my traps were, I got up early the next 

 morning, ate a hasty breakfast and put a lunch into my knapsack 

 and was ready to start out before the party of hunters was up. 

 I cautioned the hunters to see that the fire was safe when they 

 left camp and then started on my day's hunt without the slightest 

 idea that I was starting on one of the luckiest days I ever had. 



I had to climb a high ridge, then my route was for some dis- 

 tance on a long ridge, which I would follow for a distance of a 

 mile and a half, when I dropped off the right hand side of the ridge 

 into a ravine where I had a bear trap set. This ridge was a clean 

 open one of beech and maple timber. I knew it would keep me 

 busy the entire day to get over the trap line, the best that I could 

 do, so had no intention of spending any time looking after deer. 

 When I got to this open ridge, I took a dog trot along the ridge. 



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