Minnesota. I am glad I am not at home; I get so
angry with the "mugwumps," and get to have such scorn and
contempt for them, that I know I would soon be betrayed into
taking some step against them, much more decided than I
really ought to take.

The hunting trips which Roosevelt and Merrifield made on this side or
the other of the trail had their charm, and their perils also. There
was one excursion, while the wagon was crawling up the Clear Fork of
the Powder River, which for several reasons remained memorable.

The party was out of food, for the country they had been traversing
was not favorable for game, and Roosevelt and Merrifield started forth
one afternoon, with hope goaded by necessity, to replenish the larder.

Where the hilly country joined the river bottom, it broke off into
steep bluffs, presenting an ascent before which even a bronco, it
seemed, had his hesitations. Roosevelt and his companion rode into a
wash-out, and then, dismounting, led their ponies along a clay ledge
from which they turned off and went straight up an almost
perpendicular sandy bluff. As Merrifield, who was in the lead, turned
off the ledge, his horse, plunging in his attempt to clamber up the
steep bluff, overbalanced himself, and for a second stood erect on his
hind legs trying to recover his equilibrium. As Roosevelt, who was
directly beneath him, made a frantic leap with his horse to one side,
Merrifield's pony rolled over backwards, turned two complete
somersaults and landed with a crash at the bottom of the wash-out,
feet uppermost. They did not dare to hope that the horse would not be
"done for," but he proved on investigation to be very much alive.
Without aid he struggled to his feet, looking about in a rather
shame-faced fashion, apparently none the worse for his fall. With
vigorous pulling, they drew Roosevelt's pony to the top, and by the
same method, augmented with coaxing and abuse, they brought his fellow
to his side at last, and proceeded on their excursion.

Late in the afternoon they came on three blacktail deer. Roosevelt
took a running shot at two hundred yards and missed, took another and
missed again, though this time he managed to turn the animals in their
flight. They disappeared round the shoulder of a bluff, and Roosevelt,
suspecting that they would reappear when they had recovered from their
terror, elevated his sights to four hundred yards and waited. It was
not long before one of the