The Wbitetail Deer 95 



up — fortunately in the right direction. Taking 

 advantage of a slight inequality in the soil, I 

 managed to get behind one of these tufts, and 

 almost immediately saw the buck. Toward the 

 head of the coulie the brush had ^become scanty 

 and low, and he was now walking straight for- 

 ward, evidently keeping a sharp lookout. The 

 sun had just set. His course took him past me 

 at a distance of eighty yards. When directly 

 opposite I raised myself on my elbows, drawing 

 up the rifle, which I had shoved ahead of me. 

 The movement of course caught his eye at once ; 

 he halted for one second to look around and see 

 what it was, and during that second I pulled the 

 trigger. Away he went, his white flag switching 

 desperately, and though he galloped over the hill, 

 I felt he was mine. However, when I got to the 

 top of the rise over which he had gone, I could 

 not see him, and as there was a deep though 

 narrow coulie filled with brush on the other side, 

 I had a very ugly feeling that I might have lost 

 him, in spite of the quantity of blood he had left 

 along his trail. It was getting dark, and I plunged 

 quickly into the coulie. Usually a wounded deer 

 should not be followed until it has had time to grow 

 stiff, but this was just one of the cases where the 

 rule would have worked badly ; in the first place, 

 because darkness was coming on, and in the next 

 place, because the animal was certain to die 



