fired at the bunch with the remark that I guessed that I could
drive him out of there after a while.

I left the bear skin and knapsack at the rock, knowing that the rock
would be a good landmark to find them by and went down through the
laurel to see what effect my shot had. When I got to where the deer
were, when I shot, I readily saw plenty of blood on the green laurel
leaves and I only had a few steps to go when I saw the buck lying
dead. I cut his throat and stood waiting for the blood to stop
flowing and saw a trail that was fresh. I could readily tell by the
way the leaves and ground were torn up that the trail was of some
animal that was having a hard time to keep on its feet. You can
imagine my joy and surprise to get two deer so unexpectedly. I had
only a few rods to go when I found a good big doe dead.

Well, you may guess that I lost no time in getting the entrails out
of these two deer and swinging them up as I had the other two for it
was getting well past noon. I would be a good five miles from camp
when I got to my first marten trap.

After I got to the top of the divide, I made the best time that was
in me. I looked at several fox and marten traps but none had been
disturbed. When I got to the first bear trap on the divide I had an
occasion to scold and scold hard, but all to no purpose. I found the
limb of a tree jammed in between the jaws of the trap. Of course, I
thought some hunter had done me the favor and having as hard a stunt
ahead of me, you can guess that the trick was not pleasing to me.
Well, here I learned how foolish it was to fly off the handle before
you know what has been doing. Now, after a little investigation, I
found that the limb had been broken from the tree by the wind and it
so happened that it fell right onto the pan of the trap and sprang
it. Setting the trap, I hurried on to the next bear trap and here I
had another chance to be disgusted, even more than in the first case.
This time it was a porcupine in the trap but there was nothing to be
done, only reset the trap and hurry on again. None of the other traps
were disturbed, neither the small traps nor the bear trap until I
came to the last marten trap which had a marten in it. It was now too
dark to see to skin it so I was obliged to dump the carcass into the
knapsack and tote it along with the coons and mink pelts.

I had about one mile to go to reach the road, then four miles to camp
and I often thought what a hunter