738 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Nov. 18, 1911. 
A Sheep Hunter’s Diary 
Pictures and Text by the Judge 
(Continued from last week.) 
sandwich, a couple of apples and some wild 
grapes, has a flavor you cannot define or de¬ 
scribe. The little brook at your side keeps 
singing merrily, the wind plays among the tree- 
tops, and the whole forest seems to have put 
on its gayest, most regal dress in honor of some 
tremendously important event. In spite of 
everything, you can see little of sadness in the 
passing of summer. Perhaps you moralize more 
or less on the procession of life and death, but 
your mind is chiefly occupied with the pleasant 
sights and sounds of the autumn woods. You 
are happy. 
Stretching out on a bed of moss and leaves 
you watch through an open space in the trees 
the light curtain of clouds pass swiftly overhead. 
It has been so long since you have really seen 
the sky, with its infinite variety of cloud-forms 
and colors. And soon you pass from a long 
brown study into a sweet sleep. 
When you awake you find it is nearly 3 o’clock, 
a rattling good time to hunt gray squirrels. The 
wind has fallen to a gentle breeze, which makes 
silence on your part still more important. You 
creep along the edge of the stream, utilizing the 
banks for cover. In this manner you approach 
a number of chestnut and hickory trees which 
you have always known to be squirrel trees. 
Everything is quiet. No sign of a squirrel. 
After remaining in a cramped position for al¬ 
most an hour you detect a movement on a 
branch of a giant chestnut. Out jumps a gray 
with a quarrelsome red squirrel close on his 
heels. The gray leaps to a limb of a nearby 
hickory, while the red remains behind, scolding 
and chattering. To be able to fire you are com¬ 
pelled to come out in the open. Both squirrels 
disappear as if by magic. While you are 
pondering over your next move your attention 
is attracted to two gray spots on a tree further 
on. You circle until you can approach that tree 
without being seen. Yes, there sit two young 
grays. When one falls the other tears off at 
breakneck speed and you see no more of him. 
The squirrel you chose has some life left in him, 
a second bullet being necessary to prevent him 
from climbing the tree from which he fell. 
Thus the afternoon speeds away. Now and 
then you start a cottontail, and once in a while 
a wary grouse. From a distant cornfield comes 
the cheery whistle of bobwhite. You have all 
the game you care for, yet you dislike to leave 
your old stamping ground. It has been many a 
day since you have had such a jolly time, 
quietly and alone. As you trudge down the 
road toward home you meet a fellow hunter, 
who proudly exhibits a miscellaneous collection 
of game. Your modest kill bears no compari¬ 
son, but you do not envy the man, with his 
twelve-gauge shotgun and his air of elation. 
He cannot understand at all what you mean 
when you exclaim: “Hasn’t this been a glorious 
fall day?” 
Misfit Prizes. 
When the sea anglers of Britain hold fishing 
competitions, they take their wives along, and 
the latter at times are keen in fishing, particu¬ 
larly when prizes are offered. At a recent com¬ 
petition, however, when merchandise prizes were 
given, there was some dissatisfaction on the 
part of two fair anglers, for one of them re¬ 
ceived as a prize a pair of waterproof fishing 
trousers, and the other won a box of cigars. 
O N the 20th we awoke sore and tired to find the 
horses gone over the pass toward Tyaugh- 
ton ; Napoleon to the rescue. Jack and Doc¬ 
tor off with Spot and Sally to bring in meat. I 
skinned out the heads and mended moccasins. Had 
a nice shave, first in ten days, and a general clean¬ 
up. Patched up my finger which Jack had cut while 
skinning the first ram yesterday. Jack and Doc¬ 
tor got back at 4 o'clock with one hundred 
pounds of meat. Delicious broiled mutton for 
on jack’s glacier. 
supper, and just think of it, most sportsmen leave 
the whole carcass to the eagles and coyotes. 
Sept. 21.—A grand old camp-fire last night, and 
the air so clear and stars so bright in our valley 
after the storm. The dipper and Mars have been 
brought out and hung up again. Everybody sang 
and everyone is full of good cheer now. This 
morning up at five and off for Stick Lake. Good¬ 
bye to Gun Creek and sheep camp. Arrived at 
Stick Lake 4 p. m., all tired, a long march. We 
saw ten ewes in the morning as we came over 
the pass between Gun Creek and Tyaughton, 
making seventy-seven sheep seen to date, of 
which nine were fair rams. 
Sept. 22.—Jack and I left camp at 7 o'clock on 
foot, climbing up out of the valley along the trail 
through the timber, on to a heavily wooded ridge 
about 1,000 feet above the valley, to hunt mule 
deer. Shortly after we turned off along the 
ridge there sprang up, fifty yards away, a young 
stag, too young to shoot, for we had plenty of 
meat in camp and were looking only for big 
stags. I have seen the white-tail deer jumping 
away through the brush a good many times, their 
white flags flaunting, and have considered them 
good jumpers, but the way this young mule deer 
leapt from the earth and sailed along, just touch¬ 
ing a high spot now and then, was marvelous. 
His white rump, which just showed above the 
small growth when he touched the ground, 
seemed to bounce right off the tops of the little 
pines every time he touched, and as he went off 
down the mountain he left upon my mind the 
impression of a big white rubber ball bouncing 
away. 
Soon afterward we saw above us three white 
rumps in the edge of the timber. I quickly had 
a bead upon one of them, waiting for Jack to 
learn through the glasses whether they were 
stags, but after a moment he declared them all 
does. An hour later a similar thing happened 
again, and while we found the recent tracks of 
several big stags, we could not locate one of 
them in the timber, and so worked up along the 
top of the ridge to the high country above timber 
line again, where we struck the track of a grizzly 
and followed it around three or four hours, 
finally coming across a recently abandoned camp 
away up in the backbone of this range of hills. 
Jack, after some inspection of the axe cuts, horse 
tracks, etc., announced this camp to have been 
made by his father-in-law, Tyee Jimmy, and 
stated that they had killed two goats. I could 
not quite make it out myself, but he seemed to 
be as sure of his facts as if he had had a wire¬ 
less telegraph outfit coiled up about him some¬ 
where. 
Returning along the backbone of the ridge until 
opposite camp late in the afternoon, we looked 
the camp over through the glasses at a distance 
of two miles, and Jack announced that there was 
a new horse in camp. I felt perfectly sure that 
he was wrong about this, for I could not make 
out the slightest difference between the horse 
which was tied back of the kitchen and the horse 
which Napoleon had tied there in the morning, 
but upon returning just at dusk we found, sure 
enough, that a Chilcotin Indian had happened 
along, accompanied by an extra little sorrel mare 
about three years old. A very sweet little thing 
she was, and old Napoleon fell right in love with 
her, but being unable to spare any more trousers 
to trade for her, finally traded his caribou rope 
and six dollars for her after spending nearly all 
day on the job. Doctor christened her “Manna” 
which it appears is Hopi Indian for “Little Girl,” 
and “Manna” she became, Napoleon riding her 
all the time thereafter, and presenting her to his 
little daughter upon his return to Lilooet. 
The Chilcotin had informed Napoleon that 
Tyee Jimmy’s party had really killed two goats 
at the camp we had found, and four more else- 
