THE MULE DEEE. 171 



brow, one hundred and fifty yards away. Holding well up, 

 I fired. The form was the leading doe indeed, and she 

 came rolling almost to the foot of the hill, w ith a broken 

 back. The knife ended her pains, but it always gives me 

 pain to use it for the purpose. This was the largest female 

 Deer I had killed in my hunt, and I was glad I had taken 

 the risks. Such beauty of coat, such beauty of form, such 

 perfection as game! Then look at those ears; nine inches 

 long and seven broad, and yet as flexible and sensitive as 

 though of the thinnest rubber! And the jet-black brisket; 

 and the tufted tail, ending in its bunch of black — truly a 

 Mule Deer! 



To gralloch her, w^ard off magpies, Clark's crows, and 

 Maximilian's jays, which are already on the ground, with 

 impudent chatter at my long delay; to go for George, and 

 get my game to camp — this filled out my day; and my hunt 

 was done. 



Next day, my good friend came up with two horses, to 

 helj) me to his place with my traps and game, and gave me 

 a fellow-hunter's greeting over my success. And it w^as to 

 fill his own empty larder, too; and that pleased me. He 

 stayed with me over night, and we took the day for our 

 work. He was an old packer; was thoroughly up in the 

 mysteries of the "'diamond-hitch;" took all the labor of 

 packing on himself, and left the lighter work to me. I 

 drank my last cup of coffee at my fire, took a last look 

 at the dear old spot where my tent had stood, and where 

 still lay "the fragrant bed with hemlock spread," and bade 

 a last farewell to the loveliest camp I had ever known. 



One final surprise and treat was yet before me. As we 

 descended from the mountains, far below, and to a height 

 of a hundred feet, rolled down the river a body of fog, so 

 white, so dense, so mobile under a gentle west wind, that it 

 seemed not mist, not fog, but an actual river of foam. Far 

 as the eye could reach, west or east, it still rolled on, as 

 distinct from the prevailing mist and fog and of as perfect 

 form as a cloud in the sky. Here and there, as a rounded 

 mass would catch the reflection of the sun, it would be of a 



