seen among the most precious treasures of many a Swiss household, each
one suggestive of some tale of wonderful bravery and endurance.

The chamois-hunters of Switzerland lead a strange life. None knows when
he departs from his home in the morning with his gun, ammunition, and
alpen-stock, if he will ever return from the mysterious misty heights
towering before him far aloft in the clouds. The pursuit of the chamois
will often lead him to the narrowest boundaries between life and death,
to overhanging cliffs, and across gorges where even the falling of a bit
of turf or the loosening of a stone would be fatal. Up, up, the hunter
must go in search of the cunning game, until lost among the cliffs, and
blinded by the thick mists which appear as clouds to those in the valley
below, he may often wander in the trackless solitudes for days, with the
terrible roar of avalanches sounding in his ears, before being able to
return to his home. And yet in face of all these dangers, the Swiss,
apart from the price they obtain for the flesh, skin, and horns of the
chamois, have an inborn love of this sport, and stories are told of many
celebrated hunters, men to whom every rock, tree, and path on the high
mountains was as familiar as the streets of their native village, and
who feared neither fogs, snowstorms, nor avalanches. But few of these
hunters, however, have died at home in their beds, for in the end
accident overtook them, and their lofty hunting ground became their
grave.

[Illustration: THE RED WILLOW AND ITS USES.]

INDIANS AND RED WILLOW.

To the Indians of the great Western plains the red willow, which is only
found in that country, proves so very useful that its loss would be
greatly felt by them. It is a bushy growth, never reaching more than
fifteen or twenty feet in height, and is found along the river-banks,
where it grows rapidly and in great abundance.

The Indian most values the red willow because from its bark he makes
what to him is a very good substitute for tobacco. To do this he strips
one of the long, slender shoots of its leaves, and with his knife cuts
the bark until it hangs from the wood in little shreds. Then he thrusts
the stick into the fire, but not so that it will burn, only so that the
bark will become thoroughly dried. When this is done, he carefully rubs
it between his hands until it is crumbled almost to a powder.

This willow-bark powder he mixes with a small quantity of real toba