30 The Wilderness Hunter. 



sessed a peculiar charm. We hunt them in the loveliest 

 season of the year, the fall and early winter, when it is 

 keen pleasure merely to live out-of-doors. Sometimes 

 we make a regular trip, of several days' duration, taking 

 the ranch wagon, with or without a tent, to some rugged 

 and little disturbed spot where the deer are plenty ; per- 

 haps returning with eight or ten carcasses, or even more 

 enough to last a long while in cold weather. We often 

 make such trips while laying in our winter supply of meat. 



At other times we hunt directly from the ranch house. 

 We catch our horses overnight, and are in the saddle for 

 an all-day's hunt long before the first streak of dawn, 

 possibly not returning until some hours after nightfall. 

 The early morning and late evening are the best time for 

 hunting game, except in regions where it is hardly ever 

 molested, and where in consequence it moves about more 

 or less throughout the day. 



During the rut, which begins in September, the deer 

 are in constant motion, and are often found in bands. 

 The necks of the bucks swell and their sides grow gaunt ; 

 they chase the does all night, and their flesh becomes 

 strong and stringy far inferior to that of the barren does 

 and yearlings. The old bucks then wage desperate con- 

 flicts with one another, and bully their smaller brethren 

 unmercifully. Unlike the elk, the blacktail, like the 

 whitetail, are generally silent in the rutting season. They 

 occasionally grunt when fighting ; and once, on a fall 

 evening, I heard two young bucks barking in a ravine 

 back of my ranch house, and crept up and shot them 

 but this was a wholly exceptional instance. 



