n
swift bounds to some big timber. There the curious track separated into
three deer trails, one of which might well be that of a ten-point buck.
Here was luck,--luck to find my quarry so early on the first day out,
and better luck that, during my long absence, the cunning animal had
kept himself and his consort clear of Old Wally and his devices.

When I ran to examine the back trail more carefully, I found that the
deer had passed the night in a dense thicket of evergreen, on a hilltop
overlooking the road. They had come down the hill, picking their way
among the stumps of a burned clearing, stepping carefully in each
other's tracks so as to make but a single trail. At the road they had
leaped clear across from one thicket to another, leaving never a trace
on the bare even whiteness. One might have passed along the road a score
of times without noticing that game had crossed. There was no doubt now
that these were deer that had been often hunted, and that had learned
their cunning from long experience.

I followed them rapidly till they began feeding in a little valley, then
with much caution, stealing from tree to thicket, giving scant attention
to the trail, but searching the woods ahead; for the last "sign" showed
that I was now but a few minutes behind the deer. There they were at
last, two graceful forms gliding like gray shadows among the snow-laden
branches. But in vain I searched for a lordly head with wide rough
antlers sweeping proudly over the brow; my buck was not there. Scarcely
had I made the discovery when there was a whistle and a plunge up on
the hill on my left, and I had one swift glimpse of him, a splendid
creature, as he bounded away.

By way of general precaution, or else led by some strange sixth sense of
danger, he had left his companions feeding and mounted the hill, where
he could look back on his own track. There he had been watching me for
half an hour, till I approached too near, when he sounded the alarm and
was off. I read it all from the trail a few moments later.

It was of no use to follow him, for he ran straight down wind. The two
others had gone quartering off at right angles to his course, obeying
his signal promptly, but having as yet no idea of what danger followed
them. When alarmed in this way, deer never run far before halting to
sniff and listen. Then, if not disturbed, they run off again, circling
back and down wind so as to catch from a distance the scent of anything
t