were ended; but this was an error. The quarters of the officers and
men and the various hotel buildings, stables, residences of the civilian
officials, etc., almost completely surround the big parade ground at the
post, near the middle of which stands the flag-pole, while the gun used
for morning and evening salutes is well off to one side. There are large
gaps between some of the buildings, and Major Pitcher informed me that
throughout the winter he had been leaving alfalfa on the parade grounds,
and that numbers of black-tail deer had been in the habit of visiting it
every day, sometimes as many as seventy being on the parade ground at
once. As springtime came on the numbers diminished. However, in
mid-afternoon, while I was writing in my room in Major Pitcher's house,
on looking out of the window I saw five deer on the parade ground. They
were as tame as so many Alderney cows, and when I walked out I got up to
within twenty yards of them without any difficulty. It was most amusing
to see them as the time approached for the sunset gun to be fired. The
notes of the trumpeter attracted their attention at once. They all
looked at him eagerly. One then resumed feeding, and paid no attention
whatever either to the bugle, the gun or the flag. The other four,
however, watched the preparations for firing the gun with an intent
gaze, and at the sound of the report gave two or three jumps; then
instantly wheeling, looked up at the flag as it came down. This they
seemed to regard as something rather more suspicious than the gun, and
they remained very much on the alert until the ceremony was over. Once
it was finished, they resumed feeding as if nothing had happened. Before
it was dark they trotted away from the parade ground back to the
mountains.

The next day we rode off to the Yellowstone River, camping some miles
below Cottonwood Creek. It was a very pleasant camp. Major Pitcher, an
old friend, had a first-class pack train, so that we were as comfortable
as possible, and on such a trip there could be no pleasanter or more
interesting companion than John Burroughs--"Oom John," as we soon grew
to call him. Where our tents were pitched the bottom of the valley was
narrow, the mountains rising steep and cliff-broken on either
side. There were quite a number of black-tail in the valley, which were
tame and unsuspicious, although not nearly as much so as those in the
immediate neighborhood of the Mammoth Hot Springs. One mid-after