no 



Life in the Open 



rising into a snow-capped mountain. The plan was to 

 sweep the range from behind and force the coyote down 

 into the open valley again. The summit reached, the 

 hunt extended along the divide and various peaks for a 

 fourth of a mile, and as the coyote had not been started 

 it was assumed that he was lying in some little cut on 

 the north slope below. 



No fairer view could be imagined. Below, the 

 valley of San Gabriel, a winter garden : vineyards, 

 groves of the olive, lemon, and orange, great squares 

 of eucalyptus, groves of the black, live oak, with lofty 

 palms here and there, and beyond, as a background, 

 the snow-capped Sierra Madre. , 



I had dismounted, and stood wiping the dust from 

 the face of one of my own hounds, and assuring her 

 of my complete satisfaction and admiration, when my 

 eyes caught a dun-coloured object, the coyote, not two 

 hundred feet down the slope. He seemed by intuition 

 to know that I had seen him, as he stopped ; and so re- 

 markable was the protective resemblance, so happily did 

 he melt into the gray of the wash that I almost lost 

 sight of him. He seemed to dissolve into empty air. I 

 whispered the situation to the lady by my side, assisted 

 her into the saddle, and just at that second, before 

 I had time to toss the reins up over her horse's head, 

 my dog and horse saw the coyote. I was jerked into 

 the saddle in a miraculous manner, and we plunged 

 down the hill. A second before, every eye was riveted 

 on the picture that spread away hundreds of square 



