IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 373 



panions; but we found nothing. Until the trails were 

 cut the canebrakes were impenetrable to a horse and were 

 difficult enough to a man on foot. On going through 

 them it seemed as if we must be in the tropics ; the silence, 

 the stillness, the heat, and the obscurity, all combining to 

 give a certain eeriness to the task, as we chopped our 

 winding way slowly through the dense mass of close- 

 growing, feather-fronded stalks. Each of the hunters 

 prided himself on his skill with the horn, which was an 

 essential adjunct of the hunt, used both to summon and 

 control the hounds, and for signalling among the hunters 

 themselves. The tones of many of the horns were full 

 and musical; and it was pleasant to hear them as they 

 wailed to one another, backward and forward, across the 

 great stretches of lonely swamp and forest. 



A few days convinced us that it was a waste of time 

 to stay longer where we were. Accordingly, early one 

 morning we hunters started for a new camp fifteen or 

 twenty miles to the southward, on Bear Lake. We took 

 the hounds with us, and each man carried what he chose 

 or could in his saddle-pockets, while his slicker was on 

 his horse's back behind him. Otherwise we took abso- 

 lutely nothing in the way of supplies, and the negroes 

 with the tents and camp equipage were three days before 

 they overtook us. On our way down we were joined by 

 Major Amacker and Dr. Miller, with a small pack of cat 

 hounds. These were good deer dogs, and they ran down 

 and killed on the ground a good-sized bobcat a wildcat, 

 as it is called in the South. It was a male and weighed 

 twenty-three and a half pounds. It had just killed and 



