226 ON THE EDGE OF THE WILDERNESS 
which were good, especially the delicate buds of 
the hard woods, and boughs of hemlock and 
cedar. He fell upon them, and then, before day 
should break, he gathered others of the herd to 
feed. They were still feeding when they caught 
the sound and smell of the dread humans, and 
rushed away into the forest, floundering almost 
to their bellies in the deep snow, so that an ener- 
getic man on snowshoes could almost have run 
the fawns down. Such bitter going as this was 
too exhausting for long trips. In spite of the 
presence of the hated man, OY Buck yarded his 
herd not far from the lumber camp, and every. 
night, before the dawn broke, or after the men 
were early asleep in the evening, he led them to 
the slash, where they fed. After a day or two, 
also, they discovered that when the horses were 
fed at noon, a lot of the oats spilled out upon the 
snow, and not all of them were picked up by the 
chickadees. Into these stray oats all the deer 
nuzzled, cleaning up each space. 
But if they discovered the oats and the sweet 
terminal buds on the fallen tops, the lumbermen 
also discovered their tracks. And one of these 
