FOREST AND STREAM. 
[JAN. 6, 1906. 


GATE BAG AND GU 




The Ourebi. 
Or the many different species of antelope in 
South Africa, the ourebi of the Colonists and 
Kaffirs, and the bleekbok of the Boers excited my 
greatest interest. Frequenting the high rolling 
plains of the interior, and being excessively shy 
and wonderfully fleet, it always gave me the 
greatest satisfaction to capture one. 
The ourebi is about two feet in height, dun 
color, white underneath, and the strong, keen, 
ringed horns of the male made him an ugly cus- 
tomer when wounded and brought to bay. One 
of my favorite localities for hunting this inter- 
esting little animal was in the neighborhood of 
Pietermaritzburg. Natal, where I frequently 
joined hunting parties, composed principally of 
the officers of the regiment stationed at that 
place. They kept a fine pack of hounds, which 
was enlarged by those owned by several citizens 
of sporting proclivities. On the morning of the 
proposed hunt the streets of the town were fairly 
alive with the huntsmen, their friends and 
throngs of natives in company with the rising 
generation of colonists. For several miles around 
every hill was occupied by knots of interested 
spectators, accompanied by swarms of striplings, 
whe seemed to be crazed on the subject. So soon 
as the hunters had passed through the suburbs 
and were fairly in the open country a profound 
silence ensued, which was not broken until the 
game was started, and in full flight from the 
baying ‘pack of hounds, when the resounding 
hullabaloo of the striplings would almost deafen 
one. As the country was almost entirely free of 
fences the riding was excellent, and the run was 
reduced to about race-course similitude, except 
for the hills and wet, swampy ground alongside 
the numerous little streams which intersected the 
country. Of course, so soon as the pack and fol- 
lowing huntsmen passed the outermost groups of 
spectators the sport became a test of speed and 
horsemanship. 
As I was generally mounted on my Basuto 
pony, which seemed to enjoy the chase as much 
as the hounds and the proprietors, I allowed him 
to take his own way, in which he exercised such 
a wonderful sagacity in making short cuts that 
in a majority of instances I was usually present 
at the termination of the run with the best 
mounted of the huntsmen, who had followed im- 
mediately after the hounds, I well remember one 
instance in which he made almost a right angle 
in his course and we arrived in time to see the 
fight between the game and his pursuers, in 
which several of the hounds were severely gored 
by the sharp, ringed horns of the game. Just as 
the game was finally overcome by the yelping 
pack the foremost of the hunters made his ap- 
pearance, completely bespattered with the mud 
and slush of a swamp into which the run had led 
him. He was soon followed by the others, all 
of whom gave vent to their displeasure in a mul- 
tiplicity of oaths, which were heavily duplicated 
when it was discovered that one of the hounds 
was severely injured. We slowly wended our 
way back to Pietermaritzburg, and it was some 
months before I joined in another chase. 
The next hunt was far more interesting and 
successful than that just described. I was pass- 
ing through town late one afternoon and hap- 
pened to meet one of the hunting club, who in- 
vited me to join in a run, to take place on the 
following morning. Thanking him for his kind 
invitation I went to the house of a friend, who 
belonged to the club, spent the night with him, 
and early the next morning took the field with a 
large party. It so happened that we had passed 
the outermost group of youthful spectators and 
their native attendants before the game was 
started. The antelope was a male, with the usual 
accompaniment of a pair of fine, sharp horns. He 
bounded away and soon left the yelping pack out 
of sight, when he made a sharp turn, which both- 
ered his boisterous pursuers, as they impetuously 
ran past the break in the trail, and it took some 
little time for them to return and pick it up 
again, when they redoubled their efforts to come 
up with the game, and were again foiled by a 
like procedure. From the several repetitions of 
this dodge I concluded that the entire run could 
be viewed from a hill nearby. -I cantered my 
pony to its summit, struck a match, lit my pipe, 
and enjoyed the run while I smcxed. After nu- 
merous repetitions of the artifice, the members 
of the club, like myself, stationed themselves on 
the numerous hillocks of the neighborhood and 
busied themselves in quickly turning the hounds 
whenever the trick was played on them. This 
proceeding was finally successful in bringing the 
game to bay, and after a vigorous fight the buck 
knuckled under without severely injuring any of 
the pack. His carcass was thrown across the 
shoulders of one of the horses and carried back 
into town, to be roasted for one of the club’s 
dinners. 
In my trips up the country with my wagons I 
would occasionally secure an ourebi by leaving 
camp at an early hour in the morning and jog- 
ging along on one side or the other of the road. 
My Basuto pony seemed to know my purpose; 
and I generally gave him free rein while care- 
fully inspecting the clumps of grass in expecta- 
tion of seeing an ourebi spring from one of them. 
I always used a shotgun, as I did not wish to use 
a rifle on such a small and rapid running animal. 
One morning I had scouted for some time and 
was about giving up the hunt in disgust, when 
suddenly an ourebi sprang up from the grass and 
I was fortunate enough to topple him over before 
he had gotten out of gun shot. At the crack of 
the gun a Kaffir, with a grunt, sprang up almost 
in direct line of my fire, and on examination I 
found that the heavy shot with which the gun 
was loaded had passed within a couple of feet of 
his head. He was on a tramp and had passed the 
night wrapped up in his kaross, sleeping off a 
thorough case of weariness from his long jour- 
ney. A bit of tobacco silenced his mutterings 
and we parted in a friendly manner, when I 
threw the ourebi across my pony’s shoulder and 
jogged off to the wagons with visions of roast 
venison for dinner. 
I was once passing along through the high up- 
lands at the foot of the Drakensberg, where I 
encountered a party of Boers on a hunt for 
ourebi, and on a good-natured invitation joined 
in the chase. They did not use dogs, but de- 
pended for success solely on their knowledge of 
the animal’s habits. Their mode of procedure 
was to conceal themselves in the tall clumps of 
grass about 100 yards apart, when another of the 
party would saunter carelessly along about 100 
yards or so, on one side or the other of the line 
of concealed huntsmen. Should he happen to 
start a buck he would deflect somewhat from his 
course, so as to frighten the animal into passing 
between two of his hidden confederates, thus giv- 
ing one or the other of them an opportunity for 
a shot at a range of less than fifty yards. Under 
the directions of one of the party I was duly en- 
sconced alongside of a dense clump of grass, with 
explicit instructions how to act in case a buck 
should be started. I had not long to wait before 
one sprang up and was toppled over by a Boer 
before it had attained full speed, whereupon the 
ambuscade was again formed in a new locality 
and the beater had sauntered along but a short 
distance before another antelope was_ started, 
which passed within less than fifty yards of my 
place of concealment. giving me a fair shot, 
which was successful, and I received the hearty 
congratulations of the party. We then moved to 
a third location, where I had a shot which did 
not prove successful, but the buck was dropped 
by a Boer, who was ambushed next to me. 
This wound up the hunt for the day, and we 
moved off after the wagons belonging to the 
party, and I dispatched a Kaffir to mine with 
orders to join the Boer party as soon as possible. 
They put in an appearance early in the after- 
noon, and I spent several very pleasant days with 
the hunters, who treated me in the kindest man- 
ne and did everything possible to swell my game 
ag. 
There was one incident which made a marked 
impression on my memory. We had left camp 
very early one morning in order to reach a cer- 
tain locality before the sun rose, when my atten- 
tion was attracted by several Kaffirs who rose up 
in the grass on the summits of the neighboring 
hills. I very naturally concluded that they were 
scouts sent out by the Boers to locate the game. 
On speaking to one of them about it he laughed 
and denied the imputation, informing me that at 
this season—which was the breeding one—the 
natives were in the habit of spending the nights 
on the tops of the hills in order to capture the 
young ourebi which had been brought forth dur- 
ing the night. If the antelope which appeared 
proved to be a female the immediate surround- 
ings were closely inspected, in order to catch the 
young one. There was a Colonial law which for- 
bade a native owning a gun, therefore he was 
obliged to use the above mentioned artifice in 
order to obtain some meat to eat with his staple 
diet of Indian meal mush and milk. 
FranK J. THOMPSON. 
Restoring Hounding. 
Minerva, N. Y., Dec. 23.—Editor Forest and 
Stream: I inclose the text of an action taken by 
the Essex County Board of Supervisors,* which 
speaks for itself; with my comments thereon. 
We have had a pro-hounding minority in the 
Adirondacks which in years past have resorted 
to every means to brave or evade the anti-hound- 
ing law of 1897; such means as killing deer on 
the sly out of season and selling them to hotel 
men; openly hounding deer to see how far the 
practice would be winked at, and sending peti- 
tions to the Legislature signed by irresponsible 
and non-voting minors in order to get the anti- 
hounding law repealed, were freely and faithfully 
tried. 
They did not all come off scot-free. Even one 
Supervisor I could name had to come to book for 
hounding deer, together with his guide, this last 
summer. 
Many dogs have been killed in this section 
while being used in hunting deer, and not alone 
by game protectors, but by the citizens as well. 
In 1897, when the law first took effect, there were 
very few deer in a radius of ten miles from here, 
the game having been practically exterminated by 
hounding. It is not the number of deer actually 
killed ahead of the dogs, for fewer were actually 
taken than in still-hunting, but scores of fawns 
were killed and devoured by hounds and other 
dogs running in the woods without let or hin- 
drance during the close season, There was an- 
other thing. Many a dry doe has been taken in 
hunting, which showed that she had been injured 
by being overheated in the chase to that extent 
that, though not killed, she was rendered incap- 
able of breeding in the future. These two causes 
worked the great mischief of nearly exterminat- 
ing the deer in this section. 
Since the practice of hounding was so largely 
stopped the deer have become so plenty that it 
has been common to see them in the open fields 
in this section, and they come into orchards 
within fifty rods of the residents’ houses to eat 
apples during apple time, and this is so common 
an occurrence that you cannot find an orchard 

*The Supervisors’ petition for a repeal of the anti- 
hounding law, so far as applicable to Essex county, was 
printed in our issue of Dec. 16 
