"NOTES ON A LATTER-DAY HUNTING TRIP IN 

 THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS" 



AS a boy I used to devour ravenously the 

 works of Ballantyne, Mayne Reid, Catlin, and 

 other writers of fact and fiction concerning 

 the wonders of the great continent of North America, 

 and from that time onwards had always nourished a 

 strong desire to visit that country. 



But it was not civilized America that I wished to 

 see, nor the works of civilized man in that part of 

 the world, since to me all cities built by peoples of 

 the Caucasian race seem very much alike, although 

 they may differ one from another somewhat in de- 

 tails. They are, however, all of the same genus, so 

 to speak, and to my mind hold nothing so grand or 

 beautiful within their dingy walls as the ever-varying 

 aspects of nature in the wilds. Hotels perched high 

 up amongst the Swiss Alps, railways through the 

 Rocky Mountains, or steamboats on the Zambesi 

 are all very good and useful things, no doubt, but 

 they destroy the poetry of their surroundings. 



The America I desired to visit was the America 

 of my boyish dreams, the land of vast rolling plains, 

 over which the shaggy bisons now, alas! extinct 



