72 



RECREATION. 



A DAY WITH THE JACK RABBITS. 



Denver, Co 1 o. 



January 29, 2 nimrods of this city ar- 

 ranged to go after jack rabbits, which a 

 friend had located on his way from Greeley 

 to Denver. We made arrangements with 

 this friend to meet us at the depot at La 

 Salle with his team and take us to the 

 promised land. 



I retired at the usual hour and had got to 

 sleep, and the jacks were running in every 

 direction; something was wrong with my 

 gun, as usual, in dreams. The shot would 

 not hit Jack hard enough to dent the hair. 

 I was cussing the gun, shells and every- 

 thing else, when the alarm clock made its 

 unearthly racket, frightening all the jacks 

 away. I got up, pulled myself together, 

 went to the window and looked out. Cold 

 and cloudy. Dressed and went down stairs 

 to make more observations. Still colder. 

 Went back up stairs, built a fire and invited 

 my wife to get up. She answered "No." 

 So I proceeded to get breakfast on my own 

 hook and was doing nicely when someone 

 behind me said, "Don't you know enough 

 to put the teakettle on the stove? Get out 

 of the way. You don't know enough to boil 

 water." I retreated in good form to give 

 way to my superior. She soon had a good 

 breakfast, to which I did justice. The door- 

 bell rang. It was my pard. I hurried to 

 take him in out of the cold. 



"Shall we go?" said he. 



"Sure ! I did not get up at 2.30 to stay at 

 home." 



Got into my shooting clothes and we 

 drilled down to the depot for the 4.15 U. P. 

 train. We arrived at La Salle at 5.45 safe. 

 Our friend was to be there at 6.30. We 

 waited for him till 7.15, but he did not 

 show up. This was nice. Two feet of 

 snow and no team within i T / 2 miles. We 

 were no'tenderfeet, so we started down the 

 track on foot. Cold ! Just zero by the 

 weather machine on the depot when we 

 left. 



We had gone 2 miles against the wind 

 when we heard someone yell behind us. 

 Looking back, we saw the handcar with 2 

 men, pumping for all they were worth. 

 We tried to flag them, but they just 

 grinned and pumped. We had a mind to 

 take a shot at them, but while we were 

 talking it over they got out of range, so 

 we gave it up. 



By that time we wanted to shoot some- 

 thing, so Pard said: "There's a jack in 

 tnat cornfield. I smell him." Over the 

 fence we went. Presently I saw Pard stop 

 and laugh. His jack was fast in a big tum- 

 ble weed. The snow was so deep that I 

 guess he thought he could get through the 

 weed easier than the snow. Finally he 

 managed to extricate himself and started 

 for Wyoming. Pard stuck up his 16 gauge 

 Lefever. Pop, and Jack died. 



After going through the cornfield we 



climbed back to the railroad and pounded 

 ties for about 1% miles more. Then we 

 had a consultation and decided to go to the 

 river, about 2 miles, and hunt cottontails. 

 We tramped through the snow for what 

 seemed about 4 miles. The river kept mov- 

 ing away. At least we could not see that 

 we were getting any nearer to it, so we 

 changed the programme to jacks again. We 

 had not gone far when I heard Pard's gun 

 pop and saw a jack kicking about it. 



That was a long shot. Pard stepped it 

 off; 68 steps, and he is no kid. Pard was 

 shooting 2% drams of smokeless powder 

 and 1 ounce No. 8 chilled shot. 



We went into another cornfield, and soon 

 I saw a brown spot on the snow. I in- 

 vestigated. It was about 25 yards away. I 

 stood transfixed. Suddenly they thought of 

 something over in the next field. Up they 

 jumped with a loud whir. We counted 14 

 beautiful Bob Whites. I have hunted Bob 

 for 20 years, but never found him so tame 

 before. There is no open season on Bob 

 in Colorado and if there were it would be 

 out before now. 



Farther on Pard stopped in an open 

 field. There was not a track in sight. He 

 called me over, and there, within 4 feet of 

 him, all cuddled up in a little heap about as 

 big as your fist, sat Mr. Jack. I guess he 

 had been there since the snow before and 

 thought best not to make any tracks. I 

 wanted Pard to shoot the top of his head 

 off, as we were out of meat, but Pard ob- 

 jected. Wanted to give him a show for his 

 life. Wanted me to shoot him. Suddenly 

 it dawned on me that I had not shot yet, so 

 I told Pard to pull, but Jack would not, so I 

 pulled. Pard told me to kick him. I walked 

 up to Jack and yelled, "Pull," but he would 

 not stir, so I said : "If you will not pull 

 I will push." I gave him a good kick on 

 the end of the tail, and he jumped, snorted, 

 shook himself and pulled for Kansas, with 

 a load of chilled y's after him from my 

 Parker. Jack and 7's got mixed up at 

 about 40 yards and Jack concluded to stay 

 in Colorado. 



We tramped our legs nearly off in the 

 deep snow, got 2 more Jacks and one cot- 

 tontail. Pard skinned me good. He killed 

 5 out of the 6 that we got. We arrived at 

 the depot in La Salle at 3 p. m., tired almost 

 to death, but happy. 



On the train home we met another hunt- 

 er. He had 11 ducks, 6 mallards and 5 

 teal. He had one jack that he wanted to get 

 rid of so I relieved him. On the train were 

 about 40 colored soldiers from Ft. Russell, 

 Wyoming, who had just been discharged 

 and paid off. They were much inter- 

 ested in our game, much more than we 

 were in theirs (craps). One of them 

 offered me 15 cents for a jack. Not much, 

 Bill. Those Jacks were worth $4 apiece. 

 At 6.05 we arrived in Denver O. K. 



Nimrod. 





