70 THE STILL-HUNTER. 



To one having much pride in his acuteness of sight 

 this would seem good proof that some other cause or 

 thing had startled the deer. But you had better lay 

 aside all your pride, and remember that this fact may 

 also prove that a deer in the woods can see you and 

 run away without your ever seeing him run. And 

 this can happen in woods and on ridges much more 

 open than these are. You probably passed your eye 

 directly over a small, dim, dark-grayish spot far away 

 among the tree-trunks without a suspicion of what it 

 was; and as your eye wandered on around the circle 

 of vision you never noticed its disappearance. Your 

 trouble is that you cannot yet comprehend in the con- 

 crete what you already are beginning to realize in 

 the abstract the difficulty of recognizing your game 

 under the circumstances under which you are most 

 likely to meet it. Your scrutiny of the woods is as 

 yet entirely too general, and is not one half as keen as 

 you flatter yourself it is. 



You now pass over nearly half a mile, when sud- 

 denly you see a grand old buck standing in a thicket 

 a hundred and fifty yards away. There he stands in 

 all the majesty of the buck on the powder-flask, with 

 his big antlers, big neck, big body, and all. 



No; do not shoot from here. He suspects nothing, 

 and will stand there a few minutes. You can easily 

 get close enough for a sure shot. Back off from this 

 ridge and work around its point. That will bring 

 you to that large fallen log that lies within seventy- 

 five yards of him. 



With chattering teeth, quaking heart, and crawling 

 hair you finally reach the fallen tree. Taking a cau- 

 tious look, you see nothing ; a still more keen and 

 cautious look reveals only a greater intensity of noth- 



