The Wbtietail Deer 79 



animal has in it two chief elements of attraction. 

 The first is the chance given to be in the wilder- 

 ness; to see the sights and hear the sounds of 

 wild nature. The second is the demand made 

 by the particular kind of chase upon the qualities 

 of manliness and hardihood. As regards the first, 

 some kinds of game, of course, lead the hunter 

 into particularly remote and wild localities; and 

 the farther one gets into the wilderness, the 

 greater is the attraction of its lonely freedom. 

 Yet to camp out at all implies some measure of 

 this delight. The keen, fresh air, the breath of 

 the pine forests, the glassy stillness of the lake 

 at sunset, the glory of sunrise among the moun- 

 tains, the shimmer of the endless prairies, the 

 ceaseless rustle of the cottonwood leaves, where 

 the wagon is drawn up on the low bluff of the 

 shrunken river all these appeal intensely to any 

 man, no matter what may be the game he happens 

 to be following. But there is a wide variation, 

 and indeed contrast, in the qualities called for 

 in the chase itself, according as one quarry or 

 another is sought. 



The qualities that make a good soldier are, in 

 large part, the qualities that make a good hunter. 

 Most important of all is the ability to shift for 

 one's self, the mixture of hardihood and resource- 

 fulness which enables a man to tramp all day 

 in the right direction, and, when night comes, to 



