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394 THE DEER OF AMERICA. 
camp, and it seemed as if each one was determined to spoil more 
of it than another. At first ravenous, then moderate, then del- 
icate, picking over the savory mess to get a sweet morsel.” 
The supper in camp is not a hasty meal, towards the end 
at least, and is usually accompanied by full accounts of the in- 
cidents of the day and of former sporting experiences, which 
are continued long after the pipes have been lighted and the 
weary hunter is stretched out upon his robe at the mouth of the 
tent, enjoying the soothing influence of the burned herb, without 
which camp life would lose half its charms. 
Perhaps the most exhilarating mode of chasing the deer, is in 
the prairie with the greyhound. The broad, unbroken prairie 
presents a field for this sport unsurpassed. After the prairie fires 
have left most of the elevated portions of the great plain quite 
naked, and the dry seasons which generally prevail in the fall of 
the year leave the sloughs sufficiently hard for the free passage of 
the horse, while the tall grass which covers them and has been by 
moisture kept too green to feed the fire, which consumed that 
which had matured and withered on the dry upland, the proper 
conditions for this unparalleled sport exist. 
The dogs should be well trained to the sport, should be strong 
and enduring, and the more experience they have had the better. 
The horse as well as the dog soon learns to enter eagerly into 
the spirit and the excitement of the chase, and evidently enjoys 
it as much as his master. It takes a smart greyhound to come 
up to the average deer on the prairies, and only one that has 
learned his lesson severely can handle the deer after he is over- 
taken. Much of this he must learn by experience aided by his 
own sagacity. His master is rarely up at the first encounter, 
and the neophyte is sure to be cut by the feet and antlers of the 
deer, which the latter knows how to use with great dexterity. 
These wounds are the chastening lessons of the tyro, and if intel- 
ligent, he soon learns how to avoid them. But the experienced 
dog appreciates help, and will prolong the chase in order to secure 
it, if it is in prospect, either from the hunter or the rest of the 
pack, and will only close when he sees that he alone can over- 
take the quarry. The expert greyhound will not attempt to 
pull down his game by main force, but will take advantage of 
his momentum to throw him, when the fall must be severe ; and 
I have seen this done repeatedly before closing. In this way he 
greatly exhausts the deer by these repeated hard falls, and gives 
time for the slower dogs to come up, or his master to arrive to 
assist at the death. 
