THE MULE-DEER 



235 



grown bucks by themselves, and occasionally a solitary 

 buck. Considering the extent to which these deer must 

 have been persecuted, I did not think them shy. We 

 were hunting on horseback, and had hounds with us, so 

 we made no especial attempt to avoid noise. Yet very 

 frequently we would come close on the deer before they 

 took alarm; and even when alarmed they would some- 

 times trot slowly off, halting and looking back. On one 

 occasion, in some bad lands, we came upon four bucks 

 which had been sunning themselves on the face of a clay 

 wall. They jumped up and went off one at a time, very 

 slowly, passing diagonally by us, certainly not over 

 seventy yards off. All four could have been shot with- 

 out effort, and as they had fine antlers I should certainly 

 have killed one, had it been the open season. 



When we came on these Colorado mule-deer sud- 

 denly, they generally behaved exactly as their brethren 

 used to in the old days on the Little Missouri; that is, 

 they would run off at a good speed for a hundred yards 

 or so, then slow up, halt, gaze inquisitively at us for 

 some seconds, and again take to flight. While the sun 

 was strong they liked to lie out in the low brush on 

 slopes where they would get the full benefit of the heat. 

 During the heavy snowstorms they usually retreated into 

 some ravine where the trees grew thicker than usual, not 

 stirring until the weight of the storm was over. Most 

 of the night, especially if it was moonlight, they fed; 

 but they were not at all regular about this. I frequently 

 saw them standing up and grazing, or more rarely brows- 

 ing, in the middle of the day, and in the late afternoon 



