274 



RECREATION. 



go up the canyon and pass the night in 

 the deserted cabin. We would then be in 

 the locality where deer signs were the most 

 numerous and would not have to travel so 

 far in the morning to reach our hunting 

 ground. We were both tired and the plan 

 was not an inviting one; but as we had 

 only one more day in which to hunt, it was 

 advisable to" make the most of it. Ac- 

 cordingly, about 8 o'clock, we rolled 

 up a pair of blankets apiece, put some pro- 

 visions in Chris's knapsack, and started for 

 the cabin. It was about a mile from our 

 camp, and the trail leading to it, even in 

 daylight, was a hard one, but in the dark 

 we were constantly slipping and falling. 



Arriving at the cabin, we soon had a 

 cheerful fire burning in the fireplace, which 

 was half furnace, half stove, improvised 

 from a few cobblestones, the top of a ca- 

 boose stove, and a few rusty joints of pipe. 

 After the chill had been removed from the 

 cabin, we lost no time in rolling up in our 

 blankets. In the cabin were 2 bed- 

 steads, made of rough pieces of timber and 

 covered with round poles. I was soon 

 curled up in one of these while Chris, with 

 many comments adverse and otherwise, 

 but all good natured, spread Iris gray blan- 

 ket on the other. The wind whistling 

 around the corners of the cabin and 

 through the branches of the trees outside 

 lulled me to unconsciousness, and when 

 the old year and the old century took their 

 departure, they saw 2 weary hunters up 

 there in that box canyon sleeping as 

 soundly and sweetly as the babes in the 

 woods, unconscious of the fact that the 

 most wonderful of all the centuries was 

 passing forever into the domain of history. 

 Our search for deer the following day 

 proved fruitless. In the afternoon we 

 wearily returned to the cabin, rolled up 

 our blankets and returned to camp, pick- 

 ing up the carcass of the blacktail buck 

 en route. Arriving at camp, we prepared 

 a hasty dinner and packed our outfit. We 

 were 4 miles from Atlanta, and it was nec- 

 essary to get our outfit to that station in 

 order to get it aboard the train, as the en- 

 gineers refused to be flagged when going 

 East. The problem of how to get a buck 

 weighing 200 pounds, and as many pounds 

 more of camp outfit, to the section house was 

 a serious one. It was decided that Chris 

 should "snake " the deer while I was to im- 

 provise a toboggan from a wagon sheet 

 and perform the same service for the camp 

 outfit. It was a primitive means of trans- 

 portation and I was constantly stopping to 

 pick up parts of the camp outfit, owing to 

 the frequent overturnings of my awkward 

 and refractory conveyance. After we had 

 pulled and tugged at our loads until we 

 were both ready to "sit down and cry" 

 we discovered an old hand sleigh, which 

 some trapper or prospector had abandoned. 



THE OLD BUCKS HEAD. 



As we placed the old sleigh between the 

 rails and loaded the outfit on it we thought 

 our troubles were at an end; but notwith- 

 standing the fact that Chris pulled liked a 

 horse, and I pushed with might and main, 

 the clumsy conveyance moved but slowly 

 and painfully. The willow runners cut 

 through the soft snow and clung to the 

 cinder covered cross-ties with a loving 

 embrace. Every 20 feet or so we were 

 compelled to stop and catch our breath. 

 After we had gone perhaps half a mile in 

 that way Chris pulled the deer off the 

 sleigh while I harnessed myself to the 

 latter and pulled and tugged for dear life. 

 We had managed to cover perhaps a third 

 of the way and had given up all hope of 

 reaching the station before the East 

 bound passenger train when in the dark- 

 ness behind me I heard a voice saying, 



"Come, lads, get that thing out of my 

 way," and I saw the hand car of the section 

 foreman, manned by that individual and 

 half a dozen Japs. I recognized him as an 

 old acquaintance, and persuaded him to 

 take the outfit on his hand car, to the sta- 

 tion. Chris and I then loaded the carcass 

 of the buck on the sleigh, and pushed and 

 pulled for an hour, but could make little 

 headway. The infernal runners seemed to 



