TO FIND GOOD HUNTING-GROUND. 17 



they will soon be too scarce. The days of the mar- 

 ket's lofty prerogative are numbered. The American 

 people are fast awaking to the fact that the true ques- 

 tion before them is not, Why should not he who kills 

 game have a right to sell it ? not, Why should not he 

 who cannot hunt his own game have a right to buy 

 it ? They are fast awaking to see that a far higher 

 question than either of those imperiously demands an 

 immediate answer. That question is, Shall we have 

 game for those who are able to hunt it for themselves, 

 who need the health-giving medicine of the woods far 

 more than epicures need their palates tickled, or shall 

 we have game for none ? Shall we have game for our 

 own people forever under close restrictions, or shall 

 our woods become a cheerless blank in order that the 

 present generation of epicures in New York and Bos- 

 ton may wax fat for a few years ? And when Amer- 

 ica awakes from sleep she spends little time in yawn- 

 ing and rubbing her eyes. 



The deer is still found in nearly every State in the 

 Union, though in many is not now plenty enough for 

 still-hunting unless upon snow. In Canada and the 

 northern tier of States in the Great West, in nearly 

 all the Territories, in most of the Southern and South- 

 western States, and on the Pacific coast it is still quite 

 abundant in large tracts of country. But it is quite 

 impossible to lay down any reliable rule for finding 

 where deer are abundant, for there is no other kind of 

 game whose movements and habits are so influenced 

 by locality, climate, season, elevation and shape of 

 ground, quality, quantity, and distribution of food, 

 amount and nature of hunting to which they are ex- 

 posed, as well as by snow, flies, scarcity of water, 

 timber, brush, etc., as are the movements and habits 



