144 The Wilderness H^lnter. 



some, adventurous Indian, with whom the hunter had 

 once had a difficulty " I had to beat the cuss over the 

 head with my gun a little," he remarked parenthetically. 

 His last feat had been done in connection with a number 

 of Chinamen who had been working among some placer 

 mines, where the Indians came to visit them. Now the 

 astute Chinese are as fond of gambling as any of the bor- 

 derers, white or red, and are very successful, generally 

 fleecing the Indians unmercifully. Three Coyotes lost 

 all he possessed to one of the pigtailed gentry ; but he 

 apparently took his losses philosophically, and pleasantly 

 followed the victor round, until the latter had won all the 

 cash and goods of several other Indians. Then he sud- 

 denly fell on the exile from the Celestial Empire, slew 

 him and took all his plunder, retiring unmolested, as it did 

 not seem any one's business to avenge a mere Chinaman. 

 Ammal was immensely interested in the tale, and kept 

 recurring to it again and again, taking two little sticks and 

 making the hunter act out the whole story. The Koote- 

 nais were then only just beginning to consider the Chinese 

 as human. They knew they must not kill white people, 

 and they had their own code of morality among them- 

 selves ; but when the Chinese first appeared they evi- 

 dently thought that there could not be any especial 

 objection to killing them, if any reason arose for doing so. 

 I think the hunter himself sympathized somewhat with 

 this view. 



Ammal objected strongly to leaving the neighborhood 

 of the lake. He went the first day's journey willingly 

 enough, but after that it was increasingly difficult to get 



