260 THE STILL-HUNTER, 



" a wild ball," and that were so slow to load that every 

 shot was fired as if it were the last ball within fifty 

 miles. 



For these reasons the deer and antelope of the pe- 

 riod are vastly different animals from those that used 

 to pose in sculpturesque attitudes about fifty yards 

 away from Daniel Boone, David Crockett, and others. 

 One third of them must be shot at, at distances that 

 the old-time hunter would have considered too far. 

 And here I refer not to what are considered long-range 

 distances, such as three hundred to six hundred 

 yards, but to one hundred and fifty to two hundred 

 yards; distances at which the old-time hunter passed 

 scornfully by the biggest old buck with the feeling of 

 full confidence of soon seeing another at less than half 

 that distance. Another third of them must be now 

 shot while running; a shot that the old-time hunter 

 with his long heavy rifle, with its long-horned nui- 

 sance of a crescent-shaped scoop in the butt, with its 

 hammer invariably upon the cap, and its trigger that 

 could not be pulled without setting it unset, rarely 

 thought of even attempting. The other third still 

 present good shots and may be nearly always killed in 

 their tracks or within a hundred yards of the place 

 where struck. 



When we come to analyze rifle-shooting you will 

 conclude that I tell the exact truth when 1 assert, as I 

 do most positively, that the man who talks of placing 

 a ball where he wishes to place it in a running deer or 

 antelope at any distance, or at one standing beyond a 

 hundred and fifty yards, is either an ignoramus or a 

 braggart who takes his listener for a bigger fool than 

 he is himself. I draw the following principles not 

 from my own experience only, but from that of the 



