196 THE WILDERNESS HUNTER. 



the unearthly yelling and hooting of the big 

 owls. 



No bird is so common around camp, so 

 familiar, so amusing on some occasions, and 

 so annoying on others, as that drab-colored 

 imp of iniquity, the whisky-jack — also known 

 as the moose bird and camp robber. The 

 familiarity of these birds is astonishing, and 

 the variety of their cries, — generally harsh, 

 but rarely musical — extraordinary. They 

 snatch scraps of food from the entrances of 

 the tents, and from beside the camp fire ; and 

 they shred the venison hung in the trees un- 

 less closely watched. I have seen an irate 

 cook of accurate aim knock one off an elk- 

 haunch, with a club seized at random ; and I 

 have known another to be killed with a switch, 

 and yet another to be caught alive in the hand. 

 When game is killed they are the first birds to 

 come to the carcass. Following them come 

 the big jays, of a uniform dark-blue color, 

 who bully them, and are bullied in turn by the 

 next arrivals, the magpies ; while when the 

 big ravens come, they keep all the others in 

 the back-ground, with the exception of an 

 occasional wide-awake magpie. 



For a steady diet no meat tastes better 

 or is more nourishing than elk venison ; more- 

 over the different kinds of grouse give variety 

 to the fare, and delicious trout swarm through- 

 out the haunts of the elk in the Rockies. I 

 have never seen them more numerous than in 

 the wonderful and beautiful Yellowstone 

 Canyon, a couple of miles below where tiie 

 river pitches over the Great Falls, in wiiul- 

 swayed cataracts of snowy foam. At this 



