218 THE STILL-HUNTER. 



A few minutes' walk, and your eye catches the bil- 

 lowy roll of a heavy body vanishing among the dis- 

 tant trees. The same old story, you see. You will 

 forget that a deer in timber even when that timber 

 is open like a park without a particle of underbrush 

 is still very hard to see. You were not looking sharp 

 enough or far enough ahead. Keep a keen eye on 

 the edge of the chapparal; for deer, though feeding 

 on acorns, still love to browse, and there are bush- 

 acorns there, too. 



Sh! stop! Don't you see those two glistening 

 points in the brush there on the left, some hundred 

 yards ahead? Never let such things escape your eye. 

 Look sharp there where the lower edge of the sun- 

 light breaking through that gorge on the east strikes 

 the chapparal. Do you see two shining points about 

 three inches long and fifteen or eighteen inches apart, 

 just above the brush? Now watch them closely. 



See! they move and two or three more points just 

 below them appear in sight for an instant, and then 

 do down. It's a big buck browsing. 



Keep down that rifle! Do you want to throw away 

 your only chance? You must make a dead shot on 

 him; for a few yards in that chapparal will put him 

 beyond your reach. 



Your only chance now is to possess your soul in 

 perfect patience for five minutes, ten minutes, even 

 twenty or thirty minutes perhaps, until he comes out 

 or shows some spot to shoot at. There is every proba- 

 bility that he will do so as 'he is right in the edge of 

 the brush; it is yet early and cool, and as there is no 

 hunting or other disturbance here, it is much more 

 likely that he will come down here to spend the day 

 in breezy shade than remain in that brush. You can 



