The Columbia Blacktail 239 



off into the brush, that would have remained in 

 the open had they not heard the step of man. 



For much the same reasons many think the 

 keenness of a deer's nose overestimated. But 

 the more one hunts the more one will be amazed 

 at the distance a deer can smell a man on a very 

 light breeze, and the quickness with which it will 

 run as well as the distance it will go before stop- 

 ping ; for when a deer runs from noise it is often 

 mere suspicion, he is not sure what the scent is. 

 The same is sometimes the case when he runs 

 from the sight of a man, though not so often. 

 But when one runs from the scent of man it is 

 because he knows full well what it is. He stops 

 not to farther question, and is so fully satisfied at 

 once that you are not likely to catch sight of 

 him that day. And this sense is so transmitted 

 by descent that the youngest fawn to leave its 

 mother will run from the distant scent of man 

 without stopping to look back until well out of 

 sight. This seems in many cases almost absurd, 

 and especially where the air is so deadened by 

 heavy timber that there is no apparent motion 

 in it. But the exceptions are caused by cross 

 currents that carry the scent away, and not by any 

 lack of keenness in the nose of the deer, or by 

 any lack of fear when the first particle of scent 

 strikes it. In this respect the blacktail is as hard 

 to circumvent as any of his family. 



