286 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[AwtlL t5, 1899. 
and no-peds ; feathered and unfeathered. The natural im- 
pulse of children, grown up and ungrown up, is to kill, 
everything that is not protected by some special reason* 
for curbing this inclination. 
It is the office of "civilization" and enlightment to 
furnish these special reasons for self-restraint, both as to 
selfishness and the killing proclivity, and to broaden these 
special reasons into general reasons — to make self-re- 
straint the riile instead of the exception. 
As Governor Roosevelt happily suggested, in a re- 
cent plea for the protection of bird life (and I resolved 
tlien and there to vote for him if I should have the 
chance for any office he might run for), let us all teach 
our children, after having first taught ourselves and our 
neighbors by our good example — let us guide them, along 
lines of broad enlightenment to a right conception of our 
proper relations to our fellow-men and to all of nature's 
children. And in this connection, allow me to say, un- 
der forbearance, let us not forget to embrace, among na- 
ture's great family of children, that member so long per- 
secuted under the spur of superstition and ignorance, the 
non-venomous snakes. I said snakes. Coahoma. 
April 4. ' 
A Jolly Camp in California, 
"Boys," said Josh one day in the latter part of June 
when we three met in "the city," "let's go over to my 
cabin in the woods and slay a buck or two. Season opens 
on July I, you know, and I can promise you lots of 
game." 
Ned and I jumped at the idea, and at once agreed to 
the proposition, acknowledging at the same lime the 
brilliancy of our friend's intellect. 
Josh was the proprietor of a ranch two hours' journey 
from the city, and, in a wild canon, had, one summer, witli 
a great deal of trouble on account of the inaccessibilitj'^ of 
the situation, built a rough cabin in which four could 
sleep, cook and eat very comfortably. 
It was located at the bottom of a deep, rocky gulch in a 
little glade covered with magnificent pines, laurels and 
other evergreens. 
The cabin of rough redwood boards, with a substantial 
roof of shakes, was 20 by i6ft., lighted by two sliding 
windows and a wide door. The broad fireplace, built of 
stones and clay, where large pine logs blazed cheerfully, 
supplied the hot coals for roasting the venison to per- 
fection, and in cool nights gave forth a genial warmth 
and cheerful glow throughout the room. 
A pretty brook of pure water that thus far in its 
course never saw the sun, always as cold as one would 
care to drink, danced by the cabin among the pines, its 
volume increasing as it went along; its gentle murmur 
gradually turning into a roar as, further on, it dashed 
recklessly over the huge boulders and fallen trees, mak- 
ing in one place a wild plunge of 30ft. clear, and finally 
emerged into the simlight miles below. 
The spot had been selected on account of many trails 
leading to the best hunting grounds in the neighborhood 
forming a junction there. 
According to agreement, on the afternoon of the last 
day of June, we three started out from the farmhouse for 
the cabin, with a pack horse, plenty of provisions. Josh's 
celebrated dog Smith and our Winchester rifles. The 
trail led over a high range of hills through a plateau 
which looked as if, ages ago, some enormous meteor_ had 
burst directly over it and scattered millions of frag- 
ments of all sizes from a speck to a meeting house upon 
it, and since that event chapparal, heath and chemisal had 
grown wherever a little soil had collected. 
Finally the trail turned off from this plateau and 
plunged down the steep side of a canon through the wild 
oats and poison oak bushes and we rushed along with a 
celerity which made up for the slowness of our ascent on 
the other side of the range. 
We clattered down as fast as the old packhorse could 
slide along, even the dog full of excited anticipation for 
the coming hunt. He had "been there" before. 
Josh remarked that we had better get that horse down 
"right side up," for if he fell it would take us all night to 
sort out horse from grub, and he didn't like horsemeat 
anyawy. . . 
Arriving all serene at last at our destination, we stowed 
things awav, picketed our horse, had our supper and 
smoke, and ''turned in" to lie awake for a long time, listen- 
ing to the soft night sounds of the forest, watching the 
ever varying glow of the burning logs in the fireplace, 
and inhaling with delight the cool spicy air loaded with 
the scent of the pines. 
It seemed as if sleep had only just come to us when 
Josh threw one of his spike-nailed hunting boots agamst 
our side of the cabin wall, and, as the crash ceased re- 
verberating through the canon, queried m a very calm 
way. "Are you fellows going to sleep all day?" 
"Let us now be up and doing, 
While the muley cows are mooing, 
While the whiskey-jack is cooing, 
And die gentle buck perambulates the vale." 
Josh is always calm, but humorous. 
To our surprise, we found that it was only 3:30 A. M. 
In spite of the early hour the odor of steaming coffee 
arose enticingly from the region of the fireplace. We 
rather sleepily began to tumble out of our bunks and 
asked Josh if he had been up all night. "Oh, no," said he, 
"I just slept twice as hard as usual for the last three 
hours, so as to come out even." , , j 
After making a temporary breakfast of hardtack and 
coffee, with our rifles on our shoulders, and old Smith 
at our heels, we commenced the ascent of the opposite 
side of the cafion. ,- , , r 
Slowly we climbed the steep trail m the dim light ot 
the early dawn, out of the pines, through open wild oat 
glades, where Josh cautioned us to keep our eyes '"peeled 
for a buck; again through chapparal that met over our 
heads across the path, finally emerging on the top of the 
ridge. , . , t. 1 d 
"Josh," said Ned, as we were leaving the camp, why do 
you call your dog Smith?" 
"Well," was the reply, "I once knew a man who called 
his friend Bob, because his name was William, so I called 
my dog Smith because he was brown— sabe?" 
It was light enough to see clearly by the time we 
reached the backbone of the ridge.- Josh, who was in the 
lead, suddenly ducked down and whispered, "Deer just 
going over the edge of the chemisal point ahead of us, 
but think it is a doe." We quietly crept along to get a 
better view, but found the deer had already moved behind 
the point. 
All excitement, we trod as noiselessly as possible in the 
direction the deer had taken in order to find out whether 
it was a doe or a buck; Josh being very particular about 
not having does shot on his ranch. 
We had not gone soyds. when our leader made a low 
whistling sound, that brought old Smith to his heels, and 
dropped behind a bush. 
We dropped also, and looking in the direction he indi- 
cated, saw two fine bucks in the shadow of the cafion 
looyds. below us, their antlers thrown back and their 
heads high in the air, evidently suspicious of danger. 
Josh whispered, "Now, boys! take 'em right and left 
as you stand and fire when I count three. Aim low, and 
darn the man that "misses. Ready? One — ^two — three!" 
The simtdtaneous crack of the rifles rang out on the 
still morning air and echoed from peak to peak. One buck 
fell. The other, only wounded, bounded off over the low 
brush. Before he had made a dozen jumps, however. 
Josh, who was prepared for just such an emergency, 
pulled the trigger, coolly remarking, "That fellow might 
just as well stay, too." 
The buck gave a tremendous bound, but came down, 
made two or three somersaults down the steep hillside, 
kicked desperately a few times and — staid. 
" 'Rah for our side," we shouted, and Ned and I 
plunged wildly through the brush, regardless of skin and 
clothing to wlaere our game lay. Josh, to whom all this 
was an old story, picked his way more leisurely ; but 
Smith, even more excited than we were, rushed yelping 
ahead ready to grasp the throat of either animal whic'i 
might not be quite dead. 
"Well done," said Josh, on joining us as we were ex- 
amining the effects of our shots, "a three and a four- 
pointer. Your first deer, too, Jay. You didn't kill him 
outright, but he would not have gone far with that hole in 
him. "By the way, you should always aim for the spot you 
intend to hit, and not for the whole deer. Overshooting 
is the beginner's great fault, but next to it comes that oi 
trying to hit the whole animal at once — sabe?" I 
acknowledged that I had not stopped to pick out any 
particular spot, but promised to do so in future — if not 
too excited. 
While we were dressing the game and preparing the 
legs in such a way that we could shoulder the deer like 
knapsacks, old Smith disappeared. In a short time we 
heard his familiar "Yap! yap!" down the canon, accom- 
panied by the almost unmistakable jump, jump of a deer 
in the bushes. We looked round and seized our rifles 
just in time to be too late. A fine buck was coming to- 
ward us, but on seeing our heads above the bushes 
wheeled like a flash and was out of sight in the chap- 
paral before we could draw a bead on him. 
"That buck jumped as if he'd been wounded in the 
leg last year," said Josh. "Wouldn't be surprised if 
Smith treed him before long." 
We swallowed our disappointment, and concluded that 
we already had enough to carry up that brushy hillside 
anywav. 
Shouldering our game, we climbed, pausing many times 
for breath and rest, now and then making wild grabs at 
the bushes to keep our balance, and working laboriously 
upward toward a spot to which the horse could be 
brought. It finally ended, however, in Josh's carrying one 
of the deer most of the way to the top, and then coming 
back after the second. He is tall and very slight, but 
apparently made of india rubber, and he could beat us 
heavy fellows all hollow at this sort of work. He said, 
when we utterly collapsed and sat down to wipe off the 
per.spi ration. "You city boys are not used to eating your 
bread with the sweat of your brows. One does not mind 
it when one is used to it." I frankly acknowledged that 
I usually preferred my bread dry; but could stand a little 
moisture on an occasion like this. 
We drew lots to see who should go back to camp to get 
the pack horse, and this duty fell on Josh. As soon as 
he left we took out our tobacco pouches and settled down 
to await his return, enjoying meanwhile, most thorough- 
ly the magnificence of the wild mountain scenery, and 
watchine, with a pleasure which strangers to such scenes 
can hardly appreciate, the light from the rising sun as it 
lit up hillside after hillside in the apparently unending 
series of canons and gorges whose depths seemed so 
dark and cool in comparison with the now bright peaks. 
As the sun rose in the cloudless sky we sought the 
nearest shady spot and began to speculate upon Josh's long 
absence, finally deciding that he must have stopped to 
repair the horse or something of the kind. At length, 
however, he appeared, and without explaining the cause 
of his detention, but with a twinkle in his eye, which we 
did not understand, proceeded to load the game. 
We retraced our steps of the early morning, and finally 
plunged into the refreshing shade of the pines around 
the cabin with a feeling of relief, the rays of the July sun 
seeming "a foretaste of the future" as Ned remarked. 
To our astonishment we found another buck hanging in 
front of the cabin door. We looked at Josh, who only 
smiled and said, "T told you Smith had taken an interest 
in that fellow. Guess the old cuss found out the deer 
could not run very fast, and staid by him until he rounded 
him up ; thought I might just as well gather him in." 
It turned out that the dog had bayed, or "treed" the 
buck, as Josh quaintly expressed it, within a hundred 
yards of the camp, and, on his way down for the horse 
Josh had "gathered him in" without our hearing the 
shot, and had dragged him to the cabin. 
We hung our game on a stout pine limb and the three 
bucks in a" row looked very imposing. 
Ned remarked that he knew lots of fellows in the pity 
who would give fifty dollars for such sport as we had just 
enjoyed that morning. "Guess some of them must be 
like the chap I had sitch a laugh over last summer," said 
Josh. Knowing there must be a good story behind the 
remark, we both immediately demanded it. 
"Well, it isn't much of a story, but you can have it. 
A 3wmg fellow I had known for a number of years asked 
me one day if I wouldn't give him a chance to shoot a 
deer. He said he would give anything to shoot one; he 
knew he wasn't much of a shot, but was sure he could" 
hit an object as large ara buck. 
"I told him I'd give him all the chance he wanted, but if 
he'd never seen one before it would either look big 
enough to scare him, or else so small that he would wish 
his rifle were loaded with a few pounds of buckshot in- 
stead of a single bullet. Still he was certain he could 
hit one, and that such a thing as 'buck fever' would 
never bother him. 
"Well, I took him out one day and placed him in a 
mighty good stand to get a shot, and put the dog in the 
brush right below him. From the tracks around there I 
was almost certain there must be a buck not far off. 
"Pretty soon Smith gave a couple of yaps and I saw 
a big fellow jumping over tlie bushes toward my confident 
friend. 
"Just at this moment I heard a succession of shouts and 
shrieks and saw him jumping up and down like a crazy 
man, waving his rifle in the air. Thinking he must have 
stepped on a rattlesnake and got bitten, I was on the 
point of starting to run toward him, when I began to make 
out the words : "Josh ! Josh ! for Heaven's sake ! there's 
a buck ! shoot him ! shoot him ! Look out, he'll get away ! 
Shoot him quick! quick!' Well, boys, I did shoot him as 
he came right up to me, but was shaking so with laughter 
that I nearly missed a dead shot. 
"I asked my friend why in blanknation he didn't shoot 
the deer himself, as that was what he had come out for. 
'Jerusalem,' he said, 'kick me; kick me hard! never 
thought of it.' 
"I couldn't keep this affair all to myself, you Icftow, and 
he had to set 'em up pretty often for a while after- 
ward ; and I hear he is very touchy ever since when you 
discuss the different forms of buck fever in his presence." 
While Josh was telling his story, we were making 
preparations for breakfast, which soon appeared. Deer's 
liver broiled on hot coals was the principal dish, and it 
vanished rapidly before our ravenous appetites, well sharp- 
ened by the morning's tramp. 
The rest of the day was spent in the usual camp style; 
that is, we swept the cabin, got wood for the fire, straight- 
ened things out, had dinner about S o'clock, and after- 
wards strolled, or rather climbed. Up on the top of a 
hill to watch the shadows deepen in the valleys until the 
sun finally disappeared behind a distant pine-fringed 
ridge. The stars commenced to speck the eastern sky, 
and the poorwill's sweet but melancholy notes were 
breaking the evening stillness as we slow'ly descended to 
the darkness of the forest camp, each deeply impressed 
hy the quiet beaitty of the scene and loth to leave it. 
While chatting and smoking around the camp-fire we 
decided to kill no more deer this time, having as mtich 
veinson as we could use, but to try to find a short cut 
to a ridge near by, which Ned and Josh had always 
reached by an old trail a long way round. 
Next morning we got a regular breakfast before start- 
ing on our explorations, and then went to the ridge by 
the long way, intending to make an attempt to cut back 
to camp through the timber. 
Old Smith did not seem to understand our w-ant of in- 
terest in deer that morning, and after a while we missed 
him. While we were all three on top of a pile of rocks, 
looking about for an opening in the forest, we heard his 
sharp bark coming in our direction, and in a few mo- 
ments a large doe came bounding along, pausing a sec- 
ond to listen within a few yards of tis. Smith showed 
up on the deer's track just as we jumped down from 
the rocks. He seemed rather confused. Josh called to 
him to stay close. He took two or three steps in th-^ 
direction the deer" had followed, stopped, looked back at 
us and again toward the deer, and finally, with head and 
tail drooping dejectedly, came back to Josh's heels. The 
latter remarked that our not potting that deer had taken 
the wag out of Smith's tail, and he looked disgusted. 
We missed him again shortly after, but thought no 
more about him untii we arrived at the camp after a hard 
struggle through brush and timber in a v'ain attempt to 
find a serviceable short cut. 
When we had absorbed a comparatively large propor- 
tion of the deliciously cold water in the little brook we 
unlocked the cabin door, and, to our utmost astonish- 
ment, there was old Smith, curled up most comfortably 
on Josh's bed. As the windows were closed and the 
door padlocked, it beat us completely; and at intervals 
through the rest of the day some one w'ould remark — 
to the trees, apparently — that he "gave it up." _ 
We took a cold lunch and loafed around, enjoying the 
shade and the afternoon siesta until the lengthening 
shadows and the delightful coolness that comes on to- 
ward evening warned us that it was time to think about 
supper. We were suddenly startled by an exclamation 
from Ned: "Great Scott! I've got it!" Without deign- 
ing to notice our inquiry as to whether he ever took any- 
thing for it, he rushed out to the gable end of the cabin, 
where he found what we had not before noticed, a rou.gh 
ladder left standing against the clay chimney, which was 
about loft. high. We followed in hot haste, only to hear 
him wonder ''how in blazes did that old duffer know that 
the chimney opened into the house." 
The mystery was solved. There were the dog's tracks 
in the ashes of the fireplace, where he had jumped, or 
rather slid down the chimney. 
"Talk about horse sense," said Josh, "dog sense beats 
it from Alpha to Omaha. I'll bet a dollar and six bits 
none of us would have thought of climbing down that 
chimney to get in, though it's big enough for two at 
once, unless it was Christmas time." 
It really was almost incredible that a dog could have 
sense enough to understand the idea of the chimney con- 
necting with the open fireplace, and to climb up a lad- 
der on the outside and scramble down on the rough 
stones inside; but the fact remained as "gospel truth," 
and can be certified to on oath by all three of us. He 
simply saw that we did not care to hunt that morning, 
and getting tired of working for nothing, had returned to 
camp. Finding the door and windows all closed, and 
longing for those soft blankets inside, he had prospected 
around and hit upon this novel method of entering a 
house^ — a la Santa Glaus. , 
When the dishes were washed that evening, and we 
were enjoying the "pipe of perfect peace;" as Ned ex- 
pressed '4, we agreed to let the deer alone for awhile and 
to pass the remainder of the time we could spare from 
business in the health-giving rest and thorough enjoy- 
ment of the pure mountain air, free from all fears of rain 
or dampness in this long California summer. Josh had 
arranged for one of his vaqueros to come for our game, 
and keeping only enbugh for our own use, we divided the 
t 
