X66 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Aug. 31, 1912 
“Ginks, doctor, I hadn't thought of that. Them 
dogs can't be beat. Sho, now,” and he rubbed 
his nose with one finger, grinned and came back. 
“Dominie, for a sky pilot you’re mighty unwil- 
lin’ to go up higher.” 
“No, Sam'l,” said I, “it isn’t that. It's the 
poor dogs. If you shot into that fulminate there 
would be a steady day’s drizzle of dog meat and 
suspenders.” 
We held a consultation and decided to go half 
a mile further along the trail and then hunt over 
the hills and valleys of a great granite nub that 
rose before us. In the clustered golden rod of 
a lovely valley four rabbits were put up, and a 
pretty sight it was to watch them play tag with 
Snob and the beagles. Has any hunter yet ex¬ 
plained why bunny doesn’t dash away from the 
dogs as she does from a man when he puts her 
out? Perhaps it is because the dogs follow so 
closely that she cannot rest after her first burst 
of speed, while with a man she feels that the 
burst has put her at a safe distance; where she 
freezes till he rousts her out again to repeat her 
comet-like swoop. At any rate I could watch from 
the cliff on which I stood just what happened 
with the dogs. When they put Molly up she 
would rush for a few yards then wait till the 
hounds came close. Then with ears back, her 
little tail bobbing, she would lope along, while 
Snob, wildly bugling and the beagles madly yell¬ 
ing would make every effort to catch up. Thus 
the chase progressed from harbor to harbor. 
Sometimes Molly would get in the long grass 
and sit up to watch where the dogs came toiling 
along with gasping howls. Once I saw her run 
across a little rill that tumbled in tiny cascades 
down from the mountain; then she doubled and 
hopped in the shallow water for about twenty 
yards. Rarely in a straight line did she go more 
than a hundred yards. But always she zig¬ 
zagged from cover to cover. Sometimes I could 
see the hounds, and they were good ones, run¬ 
ning the back trail, as eagerly mouthing as though 
Molly were in sight. Then at fault, they would 
spread out, nuzzle her up again from where she 
had “frozen” under a log. Nearer and nearer 
they brought her. till I was beginning to listen 
for the final fusilade. But Molly knew the game. 
The course ended with the futile baying of Snob 
at a hole under the rocks where only the wildly 
waving tails and rear elevations of Sport and 
Nell protruded. 
Later I could hear the crack of guns, and 
when we foregathered at the end of the valley 
there were four rabbits between 11s. “Look at 
Snob nuzzling around. There’s birds here,” said 
Sam. “Snob kin trail ’em just as well as though 
they were rabbit or fox. Only he won’t point.” 
“Bang” went Dilts’ gun. “Got him?” shouted 
he, a partridge running along the ground in a 
laurel thicket. 
But he hadn’t “got him.” From my post fur¬ 
ther up the hill I saw a big cock partridge, 
breast ruffle erect, flash by through the treetops 
and veer among the higher rocks. Up there I 
followed to watch the scene below. I could see 
the hunters stealing along in a great laurel- 
clothed wrinkle of the mountain, the dogs nosing 
through the thickets. Then I saw one, two, three, 
four partridges get up about a hundred yards 
ahead and fly silent as arrows up among the 
dense thickets and ledges beyond. 
There we concentrated. All hands were tense 
on the guns. We knew we were close to a covey 
of grouse. Round a huge boulder we crept. 
"Hur-r-r-r, hur-r-rr,” up they got. But even 
as our guns came to shoulder, another big sign 
loomed over the sights : “Danger ! Power Maga¬ 
zine ; Keep Off!’’ Hidden in those valleys laurel- 
clothed were dozens of magazines. Some of 
them contained explosives so sensitive that even 
the concussion of a gunshot might precipitate a 
crash which would split the very rocks and an¬ 
nounce in rumbling thunder-like earthquake the 
end of our chase at least. Small wonder that 
we turned our backs on the birds and hunted 
over the mountain crest where Steers assured 
us was a two-mile stretch entirely free. The 
game seemed to know somehow that what was 
danger to us was safety for them. But over 
that two-mile stretch of laurel and mountain we 
(lushed many a bird. Nor were our bags empty 
as we paused to look where the Wanoche flowed 
in silver thread to join the long lakes lying 
amid the silent mountains which rose, crest on 
crest, till they stretched away like huge tepees 
far as the eye could reach. 
From the crags we could see the works lying 
in the hollows; romance and thrills enough they 
were among the commonplace. From here were 
going forth cases of shells to fill the belts of 
hunters in the far North. On the prairies of 
the West as in the meadows of the South those 
shells would spit fire against gray dawns where 
hunters followed warm trails to the music of 
hounds or the silence of the wilderness. Across 
the ocean to the land of big game those shells 
were going, to rest at last among the tropic 
grasses where lions roared, or to lie perchance 
among the snow-capped crags of the Himalayas. 
What stories they could tell were their red cases 
tongues and their single eye sight-endowed. 
What hunter’s songs those brazen pipelets would 
roll forth on wold and wild. Wolf and tiger, 
leopard and lion, elk and elephant — all alike 
would answer them with rage, roar or death 
howl. How many tense moments in the face 
of saber teeth and smiting claws these tiny tubes 
would share! And how many a lone hunter, 
hunger-pressed or standing at bay, would steady 
his thumping heart to pray that the shot would 
not fail! 
So, with the music of the hounds lilting from 
the distant coverts or swelling in chorus through 
the tree-covered trails, we worked down through 
the laurel to the lake shore and more magazines. 
Here plump squirrel were feeding, plenty of 
them, scrambling up the trees or sitting, brush 
awave, calmly eating, while rabbits hopped along 
the path or took refuge under the works where 
tons of explosives were being made. 
Once across the water we were on freer 
ground. The cap works indeed was within two 
miles, but we swung along parallel to it. Steers 
picked up another rabbit, then Dilts a grouse 
which chanced to get up in the only open space. 
Grouse after grouse flew up, now singly now in 
pairs. Among the caves of the singularly wild 
rocks we found spoor of skunk and fox. Again 
we came across abundant deer sign. Sam pointed 
out a place where two children strayed from 
home, had been found the next fall by fox 
hunters, and all this almost within sight of the 
big city. 
But the climax of all came just as we were 
drinking in the beauty of the scene. The 
beagles put up another rabbit which rushed al¬ 
most into Snob’s jaws. With a twist like a 
jumping-jack she dodged and Snob rolled head 
over heels in mad scramble to turn as quickly. 
Then pell-mell the three dogs, rabbit and all 
swept over the crest of the knob and down on 
the hunters below. I saw Molly just ahead of 
Snob, Snob sitting on his tail, his fore feet 
braced, his mouth open and howling, slide fully 
twenty feet down the smooth rock, while Sport 
and Nell rolled after him in a shower of leaves 
and pebbles right across the front of the three 
gunners below. Who fired first or last nobody 
knows. “Bang! bang! Ba-bang! ba-bang!” went 
the guns. Leaves flew; shot rattled through the 
trees, and Molly? Molly stopped for one brief 
instant after the last shot, wagged her tail with 
exactly the expression of a naughty boy when 
he put his fingers to his nose. She stopped, 
looked back and then hopped quietly off among 
the rocks. 
It was too much. We collared Snob and the 
beagles; packed our guns and made for the home 
trail. Where the full moon rose in ruddy splen¬ 
dor behind the hills and v in the glare of the 
head lights, bunnies danced from time to time 
across the road. 
THE TOP RAIL. 
C S. Johnson, a deputy game warden in 
Illinois, shut his eye for personal business so he 
could get a bead on a lawbreaker for the State. 
It happened this wise: Brother Johnson runs a 
hotel for sportsmen down in Siloam, a pretty- 
popular place among the fraternity, but as you 
will see, no good place for the transgressor of 
the game laws. A few days ago a chap from 
Paris, Ill., registered at the Johnson hostelry, 
went to his room, unloaded his suit case of a 
bunch of quail, rang for the bell hop, and as 
the hotel is active, so are the hops, and in a 
twinkle the boy arrived. “Take these to the chef 
and have them cooked for my dinner,” said he 
handing the quail and a quarter to the hop. Now 
this chef wasn’t French. He was Illinois, and 
he knew the game laws. Upstairs he planed, 
striking the steps only often enough to steer 
himself, until he volplaned into Warden John¬ 
son. “Boss,” said he, “the gent from Paris, now 
in room 13, gave the boy a quarter to bring a 
bunch of quail down for me to cook.” 
“Quail, 13 and a quarter,” shouted Johnson. 
“His number is unlucky. He gave the boy some¬ 
thing he won’t get here and it’s close season on 
quail.” 
The guest from Paris was shocked when he 
found the hotel proprietor, with the aid of a 
Justice of the Peace had added $76.50 to his 
hotel bill, and then Mr. Johnson wouldn’t serve 
him the quail. 
This is a true story, honest and true. It 
was told me by E. E. Pierson, of Bloomington, 
Ill. 
Grizzly King. 
