170 



THE XATTOXAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



Photograph by George Shiras, 3d 



A DEER FAMILY FEASTING ON MOUNTAIN-ASH BERRIES BEFORE THE BOAT-HOUSE 



These wild berries were so placed that deer passing toward the garden would fire the 

 flashlight, showing the boat-house in the background (see page 191). 



"A sportsman's life consists largely of 

 three elements — anticipation, realization, 

 and reminiscence. The look forward to 

 the trip by rail, by canoe, and then per- 

 haps a tramp on foot into the heart of 

 the wilderness ; then the camp and its 

 pleasant surroundings, and that memor- 

 able day when the early morning sun 

 casts a glint upon the branching antlers 

 of a mighty moose as, half concealed in 

 the thicket, he furtively browses his way 

 along; the breathless wait until the neck 

 or shoulder becomes exposed ; the shot, 

 and then — success — that is, sudden death, 

 or perhaps delightfully intensified by a 

 hasty scramble after the wounded beast 

 on a blood-stained trail, at the end of 

 which we find our victim dead or dying. 



"Would that we could realize that what 

 is game to the rifle is game to the camera ! 

 Nearly every sportsman will admit that 

 the instant his noble quarry lies prone on 

 the earth, with the glaze of death upon 

 the once lustrous eye, the graceful limbs 

 twisted in the rigors of death and the tiny 

 hole emitting the crimson thread of life, 

 there comes the half-defined feeling of 

 repentance and sorrow. 



"The great desideratum, after all, con- 

 sisted of neither meat nor antlers nor 



hide. Therefore the conclusion is reached 

 that much of the large game, when suc- 

 cessfully hunted, is the victim of an ab- 

 normal incentive. 



"Surely we do not travel a thousand 

 miles, indifferent to time, labor, and ex- 

 pense, to get a few hundred pounds of 

 wild meat, probably not half so tooth- 

 some as the domestic cuts in the market 

 stalls of our own town and costing very 

 much more. 



THE THRIEE OE THE CAMERA HUNT 



"Every camera hunter will admit, even 

 though once a successful sportsman, that 

 there is more immediate and lasting 

 pleasure in photographing a deer at 

 twenty yards than in driving a ball 

 through its heart at one hundred yards. 

 Then, think of the unlimited freedom of 

 this noiseless weapon. No closed season, 

 no restriction in numbers or methods of 

 transportation, no posted land, no pro- 

 fessional etiquette in the manner of tak- 

 ing your game. 



"You can pull on a swimming deer or 

 an elk floundering in the snow; take a 

 crack at a spotted fawn ; bag the bird in 

 its nest or string your cameras out with 

 a thread across the runwav and gather in 



