112 THE WILDERNESS HUNTER, 



I was finally helped to success by a char- 

 acteristic freak of the game I was following. 

 No other animals are as keen-sighted, or are 

 normally as wary as prong-horns ; but no 

 others are so whimsical and odd in their be- 

 havior at times, or so subject to fits of the most 

 stupid curiosity and panic. Late in the after- 

 noon, on topping a rise I saw two good bucks 

 racing ofif about three hundred yards to one 

 side ; I sprang to the ground, and fired three 

 shots at them in vain, as they ran like quarter- 

 horses until they disappeared over a slight 

 swell. In a minute, however, back they came, 

 suddenly appearing over the crest of the same 

 swell, immediately in front of me, and, as I 

 afterwards found by pacing, some three hun- 

 dred and thirty yards away. They stood side 

 by side facing me, and remained motionless, 

 unheeding the crack of the Winchester ; I 

 aimed at the right-hand one, but a front shot 

 of the kind, at such a distance, is rather dif- 

 ficult, and it was not until I fired for the 

 fourth time that he sank back out of sight. I 

 could not tell whether I had killed him, and 

 took two shots at his mate, as the latter went 

 ofT, but without effect. Running forward, I 

 found the first one dead, the bullet having 

 gone through him lengthwise ; the other did 

 not seem satisfied even yet, and kept hanging 

 round in the distance for some minutes, look- 

 ing at us. 



I had thus bagged one prong-buck, as the 

 net outcome of the expenditure of fourteen 

 cartridges. This was certainly not good 

 shooting ; but neither was it as bad as it 

 would seem to the man inexperienced in an- 



