OF SHOOTING AND FISHING 39 
_ beautiful little head—anything but typical. There 
were twenty-two points and no shovels, but the 
beam was ribbon-like, the color yellow, and the sym- 
metry beautiful—in fact, I never saw such a pretty 
head for its size. My bullet had broken his neck, 
and the animal had fallen head first down a steep 
place, burying his horns deeply in the soft ground 
near the stream. 
Semond had heard the shot, so he came up and 
assisted in skinning, while I recrossed the stream 
to look for the grouse. The two birds were still 
walking about where I had left them, so they were 
promptly bagged for supper. Most of these Amer- 
ican grouse are stupid, and will watch their friends 
being executed with the greatest interest, making 
no effort to escape their own turn. These were 
the only grouse I saw on this trip. They were 
once very numerous here, but of late years had be- 
come scarce. The only birds seen by me in a week 
were a few great northern divers, several pairs 
of jays, these grouse, and a few tits of sorts. 
Squirrels enlivened the forest with their chatter, 
and were exceedingly numerous. It is a great 
pleasure watching one of these friendly and in- 
quisitive creatures. It will come within a few feet 
of a motionless observer and then dart off up a 
tree, from behind the trunk of which it will sur- 
vey him for a while, finally coming back beside him 
and proceeding with its business of arranging win- 
ter supplies. 
When the men had finished their operation, we 
‘hit the trail’? for camp and found Semond had 
