vi PREFACE TO ILLUSTRATED EDITION. 



The fact that this edition is illustrated must not mislead 

 the reader into ignoring the advice given in the text about 

 taking his ideas of hunting from pictures. Those in this 

 edition are no exception to the rule. Those by Mr. 

 Rungius are from the standpoint occasionally reached by 

 the most finished skill, and so intensely satisfactory after 

 long and careful work. 



Those by the author are maps or diagrams rather than 

 pictures, and are from the standpoint he knows too well 

 the novice is bound to occupy. They are an attempt to 

 give him what he most needs to know and what perplexes 

 him the longest, a vital conception of the cold reality 

 that takes the place of the bright rainbow of expectation. 

 He wants to know, above all else, why it is he cannot even 

 see a deer. He can understand why he may miss one 

 but the idea of not even seeing one, at any distance, even far 

 out of shot, is something he never dreamed of. 



Consider that about one hundred men are annually 

 killed in the United States by mistake for a deer, some- 

 thing that happens in no other country, and with no other 

 game even here. How could this be if pictures of hunt- 

 ing bore any resemblance to the reality ? Why, it simply 

 could not. If it did, it could not be a picture ; for it 

 would need too much study with a lot of explanation. 

 When the requirements of art cut it down to a mere pleas- 

 ing effect, such as every true picture must be, it is so 

 simple as to be a positive hindrance to the novice who 

 takes his ideas from it. It makes him waste his time 

 looking for deer in full outline in nice open places, while 

 many a spot or mere shade, in the very places where he 



