34 The Wilderness Hunter. 



when the cowboy halted and spoke. Later in the season 

 they would probably not have let us approach them, but 

 would have run as soon as they knew of our presence. 

 Of course, however, even later in the season, a man may 

 by chance stumble across a deer close by. I remember 

 one occasion when my ranch partner, Robert Munro Fer- 

 guson, and I almost corralled an unlucky deer in a small 

 washout. 



It was October, and our meat supply unexpectedly gave 

 out ; on our ranch, as on most ranches, an occasional 

 meat famine of three or four days intervenes between the 

 periods of plenty. So Ferguson and I started together, 

 to get venison ; and at the end of two days' hard work, 

 leaving the ranch by sunrise, riding to the hunting grounds 

 and tramping steadily until dark, we succeeded. The 

 weather was stormy and there were continual gusts of 

 wind and of cold rain, sleet, or snow. We hunted through 

 a large tract of rough and broken country, six or eight 

 miles from the ranch. As often happens in such wild 

 weather the deer were wild too ; they were watchful and 

 were on the move all the time. We saw a number, but 

 either they ran off before we could get a shot, or if we did 

 fire it was at such a distance or under such unfavorable 

 circumstances that we missed. At last, as we were plod- 

 ding drearily up a bare valley, the sodden mud caking 

 round our shoes, we roused three deer from the mouth of 

 a short washout but a few paces from us. Two bounded 

 off ; the third by mistake rushed into the washout, where 

 he found himself in a regular trap and was promptly shot 

 by my companion. We slung the carcass on a pole and 



