232 THE STILL-HUNTER, 



CHAPTER XXI. 



TWO OR MORE PERSONS HUNTING IN COMPANY. HUNT- 

 ING ON HORSEBACK. 



THUS far the beginner has been supposed to be 

 entirely alone; for the most necessary knowledge is 

 how to manage a deer when alone. But two or more 

 good hunters may often assist one another very much; 

 on some kinds of ground it is quite essential to have 

 a companion; in some places it may be unpleasant or 

 unsafe to hunt alone. 



After what you have already seen of the habits of 

 deer very little information is needed about hunting 

 with a companion. By your side, ahead of you, or 

 behind you he should seldom be. Two persons are 

 much more apt to be heard than one; each one is in 

 haste to get the first look over a ridge; each one 

 hurries and flurries the other, just as two pointers or 

 setters working together on a warm trail of birds are 

 apt to excite and more or less demoralize each other 

 even beneath the very whip of the trainer. Conse- 

 quently there is four or five times the danger of 

 alarming a deer, and of missing one if shot at. Two 

 persons unless very steady shots should never try to 

 shoot at once at the same deer, or even into a band. 

 Let one have the first shot even though a second 

 chance be lost. And it is poor policy for two to try 

 and creep together even on a band of deer or ante- 

 lope. If one cannot get around and lie in the course 



