AMONG THE ANIMALS OF THE YOSEMITE 193 



hillsides and spurs eight or ten miles below the 

 summits, as if loath to leave. About the end of 

 November, a heavy, far-reaching storm drives 

 them down in haste along the dividing ridges 

 between the rivers, led by old experienced bucks 

 whose knowledge of the topography is wonder- 

 ful. 



It is when the deer are coming down that the 

 Indians set out on their grand fall hunt. Too 

 lazy to go into the recesses of the mountains 

 away from trails, they wait for the deer to come 

 out, and then waylay them. This plan also has 

 the advantage of finding them in bands. Great 

 preparations are made. Old guns are mended, 

 bullets moulded, and the hunters wash them- 

 selves and fast to some extent, to insure good 

 luck, as they say. Men and women, old and 

 young, set forth together. Central camps are 

 made on the well-known highways of the deer, 

 which are soon red with blood. Each hunter 

 comes in laden, old crones as well as maidens 

 smiling on the luckiest. All grow fat and merry. 

 Boys, each armed with an antlered head, play at 

 buck-fighting, and plague the industrious wo- 

 men, who are busily preparing the meat for 

 transportation, by stealing up behind them and 

 throwing fresh hides over them. But the In- 

 dians are passing away here as everywhere, and 

 their red camps on the mountains are fewer every 

 year. 



