CHAPTER XI. 



AN UNSUCCESSFUL EXPERIMENT. 



I ATTEMPTED an experiment the next day and wished afterward T 

 had not. There was a rifle in the Lodge fitted with a telescopic 

 sight I had never used this kind of a device for shooting game, and 

 I thought I should like to try. It was said the telescope was ac- 

 curately adjusted to the rifle. I asked about it because I knew from 

 range experience how serious is the problem of attaching a telescopic 

 sight to a rifle of high power in such a way as to insure no deviations 

 from accurate sighting. 



I showed forethought enough to attempt to sight the rifle in before 

 I went into the deer forest, but I had only an opportunity for a few 

 shots and while those all went wild except one, I thought the fault 

 was my own and not that of the sight and rifle combination. Later I 

 discovered my mistake. 



John was my stalker again and we went in an entirely new direction. 

 For the greater part our way lay over high grasslands under which 

 the water spread everywhere and gave tokens of its presence by 

 occasionally lapping over the tops of the shoes and always by the 

 squish-squash which marked one's footsteps. The fall weather in 

 these higher altitudes is not expected to be fine; one anticipates rain. 



Anticipations in the present case were not disappointed and on the 

 whole, I do not object to a certain amount of rain, but the sort of 

 downfall that came this day and the way it assailed me did ruffle 

 my temper somewhat. We were walking straight into a high wind. 

 The rain slanted down with the moving air and pelted us squarely in 

 the faces. That meant a blur over my shooting spectacles, which 

 made it impossible for me to walk twenty feet without having the 

 impression of marching bodily into a heavy fog. 



Frequent applications of the handkerchief availed momentarily to 

 remove the trouble, but after a time even that temporary relief was 



