PRAIRIE SPORTS. 
265 
or delicate article of food. In very many regions, if I am not 
much misinformed, salt pork and tough poultry are infinitely 
preferred to Venison, Grouse, or Wild-fowl, unless in the large 
and opulent cities. 
Hawks can be, and in the East—India and Persia especially— 
are trained to pursue and take the Antelope. It is said, and I 
can easily conceive it to be, the finest sport in existence. The 
fleetest of quarry a-foot, the noblest of animals, the thorough¬ 
bred horse, the fleetest of dogs, and the bravest of birds in pur¬ 
suit—the rush of the horse over the boundless green sward, the 
swoop of the Falcon through the illimitable air—what excite 
ment could exceed that. 
If I could imagine it possible, I would ask no better sport, 
than a thorough-bred horse, a brace of Greyhounds, and a cast 
of Hawks, would afford, at dawn of an autumn day, on the far¬ 
thest wilds of the West, with the Antelope, the Grouse, and the 
Whooping Crane for my quarry. 
Whether such sport will be seen ever on this side of the At¬ 
lantic, time alone can tell—elsewhere it will not through the 
broad universe; if what I dream of occur ever, ere age have 
chilled my blood, and dimmed my eye, and unnerved my bridle 
hand, I will see it, and perchance may shout the death-halloo 
of a Prong-horn Antelope. 
If not, reader, mine, I advise thee not much to try him. I 
doubt not thou wilt not take him, and if thou do, I doubt yet 
more whether he himself, or the fun, repay the toil of taking him. 
