| Show G ettina VO ITT NE DECEMBER while I 1 was out on my ranch so BO much work had to be done that it was within a week of christmas before we were able to take any thought for the christmas dinner the winter set in iii late that year and there had bad been comparatively little cold weather but one day the lee ice on the river had been sufficiently strong to enable us to haul up a of lour flour with enough salt pork to last through the winter and a very few tins of canned goods to be used at special feasts we had some bushels of potatoes the heroic victors of a struggle for existence in which the rest of our garden vegetables had suc 1 combed to drought frost and grass gras S hoppers and we also had some wild plums and dried elk venison but we J had no fresh meat and so one day my v foreman and I 1 agreed to make a hunt on the morrow it was necessary to get to the hunt f ing grounds by sunrise e and it still lacked a couple of hours of dawn when th the e f foreman oreman wakened me as I 1 lay IT asleep beneath the buffalo robes dressing hurriedly and breakfasting on 0 cup of coffee and some mouth fuls of bread and jerked elk meat we two slipped out to the barn barj threw the saddles on the horses borses and were off A mile off we crossed the river the ice cracking with noises noise like pistol shots ishits as our horses picked their way wa gingerly over it on the opposite side was a dense jungle of bull berry bushes and on breaking through this we found ourselves galloping up a long winding valley which led back many miles into the hills the crannies and little side ravines were filled with brushwood and groves of stunted ash by this time there was a faint flush of gray in the east and as 0 we rode silently along we could make out dimly the tracks made by the wild animals as they had passed and re passed in the snow several times we dismounted to examine them A couple of coyotes possibly frightened by our approach had trotted and loped up the valley ahead of us leaving a trail like that of two dogs the shar sharper per more delicate footprints of a fox crossed our path and outside one long patch of brushwood a series of round imprints in th the e snow betrayed where a bobcat bob cat as plainsmen plainsman plains men term the small lynx had been lurking around to try to pick up a rabbit or a prairie fowl As the dawn reddened and it became light enough to see objects some little way off we began to sit erect in our saddles and and to scan the hill sides bides sharply for sight of feeding deer hitherto we had seen no deer tracks save inside the bushes by the river and we knew that the deer that lived in that impenetrable jungle were cunning white tails which in such a place could be hunted only by aid of a hound but just before sunrise we came on three lines of heart shaped footmarks foot marks in the snow which showed where as many deer had just crossed a little plain ahead of us they were walking lel leisurely surely and from the lay of the land we believed that we should find them over the ridge where there was a brush coulee I 1 al riding to one side of the trail we topped the little ridge just as the sun flamed up a burning ball of crimson beyond the snowy waste at our backs almost immediately afterwards my companion leaped from his horse and raised his rifle and as he pulled the trigger I 1 saw through the twigs of a brush patch on our left the erect startled head of a young black tailed doe as she turned to look at us her great mule like ears thrown forward the ball broke her neck and she turned a complete somersault downhill while a sudden smashing of un der brush told of the eight of her terrified companions we both laughed and called out dinner as we sprang down toward her and in a few minutes she was dressed and hung up by the hind logs legs on a small ash tree the entrails and viscera we threw off to one side after carefully poisoning them from a little bottle of strychnine which I 1 had in my pocket almost every cattleman carries poison on and neglects no chance of leaving out wolf balt bait for the wolves are sources ces of serious loss to the unfenced and flocks and herds in this instance we felt particularly revengeful because it was but a few days since we had lost a fine yearling heifer no sooner was tha sun up than a warm west wind began to blow in our faces the weather had suddenly changed and within an hour the snow was beginning to thaw and to leave patches of bare ground on the hill sides we loft our coats with our horses and struck off on foot for a group of high buttes cut up by the cedar canyons and gorges in which we knew the old bucks loved to lie it was noon before we saw anything more we lunched at a clear spring not needing much time for all we had to do was to drink a draught of icy water and munch a strip of dried venison shortly afterward as we were moving along a hillside with si lent caution we came to a sheer canyon of which the opposite face was broken by little ledges grown up with wind beaten cedars As we peeped over the edge my companion touched my arm and pointed silently to one of the ledges and instantly I 1 caught the glint of a bucks horns as hd lay half behind an old tree trunk A slight shift of position gave me a fair shot slanting down between his shoulders and though he struggled to his feet he did not go 50 yards after receiving the bullet this was all we could carry treading leading the horses around we packed the buck behind my companions saddle and then rode back for the doe which I 1 put behind mine but we were riot not destined to reach home without a slight adventure when we got to the river we rode boldly on the ice fee heedless of the thaw and about midway there was a sudden tremendous crash and men horses and deer were scrambling together in the water amid slabs of floating ice however it was shallow and no worse results followed than some hard work and a chilly bath but what cared we we were returning triumphant with our christ mas dinner |
