which is to be had on this continent. The watchfulness and speed of the animals, with their courage and ferocity when brought to bay, render it anything but a holiday recreation, but one demanding great knowledge of woodcraft and skill with weapons, as well as courage and endurance. The deer we do not propose to inflict upon the reader any descripion of this well-known animal, found in all parts of the Union, from Cape Cod to the Columbia river, but merely to describe some ways of hunting him.

First driving with hounds. It is usual in this mode of hunting deer, to station the sportsmen at certain stands or passways, where the deer are expected to pass on being roused by the hounds. Armed with a double-barrel, heavily loaded with buck shot, the patient hunter must remain for hours or days immovable and silent, waiting for his game to be brought to him. There may be one chance in six that he may see the deer; one in ten that the deer will pass his stand, and one in fifteen that, if a beginner, he will have presence of mind to fire; and one in twenty that, if all the other chances occur, he will kill his game. This driving is the favorite method at the South, where the indolent gentry, wishing to kill time and procure an appetite without much exertion, keep negro hunters and drivers to do the work, while they sit all day on a log smoking.

Second: coursing with Greyhounds. This is brilliant sport, superior to any hunting in America, except, perhaps, the regular Carolina fox hunting in the pine woods. You go out upon the prairie, well mounted, with your dogs in the leash. They are a cross between the greyhound and some heavier and fiercer race, and, if right, will run into and pull down a buck single handed. It is a fine morning in December, and the surface of the prairie, blackened with the autumnal fires, is covered with patches of white frost. The air is clear and bracing, and as we ride out of town and emerge upon the open prairie, our horses, anticipating the well-known sport, prance gaily about. Our company consists of about thirty horsemen; some armed with pistols, others with rifles or double guns. We have five large half-bred greyhounds, tawny and brindled, with deep chests and strong limbs; three couple of fox-hounds, who ever and anon utter their impatient bay; two or three terriers and a crowd of curs. We push out into the prairie, steering south, towards Blue Island, where we expect to find a herd of deer. (This is supposed to be in 1840.) On arriving at the timber, five or six hunters, with the dogs, take the lead, and the rest of the field follows as it best may through the timber. We keep along through the grove for a couple of miles, when the word is given that the deer are ahead, and we are desired to spread ourselves so as to drive them out of the grove on to the large prairie south, where the dogs can run to advantage. Here let us remark, that it is dangerous to let greyhounds run in the timber, as they are very apt to kill themselves by running against trees. Slowly and carefully we proceed, with the fox-hounds in advance, their deep voices showing the route we are to pursue. At length, we come out of the grove, and spy the deer, ten or twelve in number, bounding away over the prairie about a mile off; not much alarmed, as yet, and occasionally stopping to look behind at their pursuers.

"Now, men," says our leader, "spread yourselves, and go!" The greyhounds are slipped, and start at full speed, followed by the crowd of shouting riders and yelling curs. The deer take the alarm at once, and, after making two or three very lofty bounds, as if to try their limbs, they set off at a rate which would seem likely to carry them out of sight very soon. We go at our best pace for about a mile, when the field begins to grow select. First, the big gray, with the butcher on him, gives out, and a canter is all that can be got out of him. Next the bay colt and the black mare, hired from a livery stable, and ridden by two spruce looking young clerks, are brought to a trot, blowing heavily. Now those three Germans, rigged out "en grand chaseur," with guns strapped to their backs, game bags large enough to hold a well grown fawn, and hunting horns round their necks, have pulled up their tired nags, which have hardly got a puff in either of them, and proceed with great deliberation to light their pipes.

"

'Halloo! Mike! is your mare done?"

Sure and I have no call to them craturs wid the horns, and why would I be breaking the ould mare's heart this way ?" said the Irish drayman, who, being of a sporting turn, and owning a nice gray mare which was quite fair for a quarter race, had engaged her in a business for which she was not quite able.

on

Five or six more begin to show "bellows to mend," and gradually to drop astern, as we get along into the prairie, and it is evident that the deer are making for the next grove, some five or six miles further. We had run them about three miles at a killing pace, when the str things was as follows: About a quarter of a mile behind the deer are the greyhounds, running on a line about ten feet apart. A quarter of a mile behind them are the fox-hounds, ciose together, and tails well up, with a breast-high scent and a full cry. Just behind them comes Major D., a thorough-bred chestnut horse, who goes as if he could keep that stride to the Mississippi. Then, side by side, came Dr. C., on a powerful bay Morgan, who looked as if the pace was a little too good for him, and the writer, on a mare of the Major's raising, called Creeping Kate; she was by his sorrel horse, which is directly decended from Henry and Eclipse. No wonder, then, that she can run a little, though she is over ten years old. Straggling behind these come half a dozen of the best mounted of the field the rest, with the cur dogs, are nowhere.

"Will they get to the grove, Major?" said I. "Not all of them, I reckon," he replied, turning half round in the saddle, "if those greyhounds are good for anything." "I'll answer for old Spring," said I, "that is the brindled dog on the right; he will make his rush directly, and then you will see the fur fly."

Just then, as if by mutual agreement, the five greyhounds extended their front so as to be on the flanks of the flying herd, then increased their speed, till in ten minutes they were abreast; then they began to close up with the deer. Now the chase is most exciting-deer and dogs are both doing their best, while we have to ply the spur to keep our places in the hunt. At this moment old Spring makes his rush, seizes the big buck by the haunch and capsizes him; the other dogs follow his

example, and the prettiest kind of a skirmish ensues-deer and dogs rolling over in the snow, kicking, striking, biting, and growling. Those of the deer who were not seized by the greyhounds scattered in all directions, and Dr. C., pulling up his not unwilling horse, got a double shot at about sixty yards. One he knocked over and the other he missed. Seeing a young buck going off alone on a course which would cross my track, I start to head him off. He bears off to the right, but after a run of two hundred yards, I close up within twenty yards of him, and give him a ball from my pistol, behind the shoulder; he falls, and I ride up to give him a shot in the head, and have dismounted for the purpose, when up he jumps with his hair all standing the wrong way, and comes at me. Fortunately, however, I have a loaded pistol in my belt, with which I give him a ball through the brains. Then cutting the deer's throat, and having with some difficulty persuaded Kate to allow the carcass to hang across her back, I mount to ride in search of the rest of the party.

The whole thing was over, I soon saw, as I approached the group of horsemen near the grove. The greyhounds had killed three, Major D. had shot one with his pistol, Dr. C. had one, and two of the ousiders had killed one each; eight in all, out of a herd of eleven.

Third: still hunting. This is precisely what the English call "stalking," and signifies going forth alone (or, if attended by a dog, he must keep at heel till you have wounded your game), to do battle against the monarch of the woods; to set man's knowledge and skill agains e instinct of the animal. You walk slowly and quietly along through the woods, like a ghost, leaving no sound of your footfall; your eyes glance constantly round; sometimes for five minutes you stand still in the shadow of a big tree trunk, to the color of which your dress corresponds so nearly, that, when not in motion, you are invisible. A stranger of an imaginative turn of mind, on meeting you in the forest so employed, would take you for the spirit of old Daniel Boone, or Natty Bumpo, moving West, out of the way of the settlements. Truly this, and not angling, is the "Contemplative Man's Recreation."

The object of all this spirit-like gliding, is that you may get a sight of the deer before he sees you. It is a question of precedence. If the deer sees you first, and his eyes are quick, he quietly slips off, and you must glide after another. If you get the first sight, and it is astonishing to what a pitch of accuracy the eye may be educated, you stand still, and, like Austria, wait the progress of events. If the deer comes straight towards you, of course the game is your own, if you can keep still till he gets within shot. But if, as is most probable, he takes another course, you must fly from tree to tree, and from cover to cover, with the quickness and invisibility of an owl or an Indian, till you get within shot, when your rifle must do the rest.

This is the favorite manner of hunting deer in the western forests: a man needs nothing for it but a rifle and a good pair of legs and eyes; the latter especially, for a near-sighted man can never excel at this sport. Those, however, who try it, become so fond of it as to despise all other hunting. We have seen deer stalked, with great success, by means of a

sled and a yoke of oxen. Let the hunters lie down in the bottom of the sled among the hay, and let the driver drive his team not directly towards the deer, but round them in concentric circles, gradually lessening in diameter, till he carries you within ten rods of them. The writer was one

of a party of four, who by the sled dodge got six deer in one morning, and ought to have killed twice as many, from the number of fair shots we had.

The Panther. This, the largest and most formidable of the North American cats, is seldom seen upon the plains, except when traveling from one grove to another. They prefer a mountainous and broken country.

The Northern Lynx.-A few years ago this animal was rather common in Northern Illinois, a specimen having been killed within the limits of the present city of Chicago about twelve years since. This lynx feeds upon birds, and other small animals, and seems, notwithstanding its formidable size, to be a timid animal, and easily killed. It is sometimes

eaten.

The Black Bear. Although the country on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan abounds with these animals, they are seldom seen on the west side of the Lake, and then only as transient visitors; they preferring a heavily timbered country, which furnishes them with more food and shelter than they can get on the prairies.

We have always thought that there was something more human about the bear than the other prowlers of the woods; and so think the Indians, who call him "brother," and when they kill him for food, or from a desire to appropriate his thick overcoat, generally apologize to him for the liberty, and attribute it solely to their necessities. Like man, the black bear is omniverous, though he prefers fruit and vegetables; seldom meddling with the sheep or hogs if he can get berries or mast. He is not aggressive in his temper, but likes his share of the road, and does not allow himself to be crowded. Instead of roving about the country in the winter, mad with cold and hunger, like the ferocious and disreputable wolf, our bear snugly stows himself away in his den and sleeps till spring. He is an excellent boxer, and, in a ring fight, would puzzle the best shoulder-hitter in New York to touch him, while a wipe from his paw would take the conceit out of Hyer or Yankee Sullivan. There are many bear stories about, but the following, by an old Hoosier, is one of the best we remember:

"When I came into this neck of woods, about twenty years back, there was a powerful chance of 'Bar' yer. Many is the good hide I've shucked off the varmints, and many a jar of ile I've toted down to Lar Fayett, for the pottecaries, and me and my old woman always all'owed that bar meat did stick to the ribs better than hog. I was goin' to tell you of her scrape with the old he bar. It was in the spring, airly, one day, when I was away in the timber with the boys, mauling rails, that the sarcomstance happened, which made me laugh powerful, I tell ye. The old woman was alone in the cabin, frying out some pork fat, say near sundown, when this old he, traveling through the timber, smelt the fat I reckon, for he clim the fence and came snuffing round the cabin. We had