nd meat was usually sold in Portage; the balance furnished their
families with abundance of venison, bear grease, and pies.

Winter wheat is sown in the fall, and when it is a month or so old the
deer, like the wild geese, are very fond of it, especially since
other kinds of food are then becoming scarce. One of our neighbors
across the Fox River killed a large number, some thirty or forty, on a
small patch of wheat, simply by lying in wait for them every night.
Our wheat-field was the first that was sown in the neighborhood. The
deer soon found it and came in every night to feast, but it was eight
or nine years before we ever disturbed them. David then killed one
deer, the only one killed by any of our family. He went out shortly
after sundown at the time of full moon to one of our wheat-fields,
carrying a double-barreled shotgun loaded with buckshot. After lying
in wait an hour or so, he saw a doe and her fawn jump the fence and
come cautiously into the wheat. After they were within sixty or
seventy yards of him, he was surprised when he tried to take aim that
about half of the moon's disc was mysteriously darkened as if covered
by the edge of a dense cloud. This proved to be an eclipse.
Nevertheless, he fired at the mother, and she immediately ran off,
jumped the fence, and took to the woods by the way she came. The fawn
danced about bewildered, wondering what had become of its mother, but
finally fled to the woods. David fired at the poor deserted thing as
it ran past him but happily missed it. Hearing the shots, I joined
David to learn his luck. He said he thought he must have wounded the
mother, and when we were strolling about in the woods in search of her
we saw three or four deer on their way to the wheat-field, led by a
fine buck. They were walking rapidly, but cautiously halted at
intervals of a few rods to listen and look ahead and scent the air.
They failed to notice us, though by this time the moon was out of the
eclipse shadow and we were standing only about fifty yards from them.
I was carrying the gun. David had fired both barrels but when he was
reloading one of them he happened to put the wad intended to cover the
shot into the empty barrel, and so when we were climbing over the
fence the buckshot had rolled out, and when I fired at the big buck I
knew by the report that there was nothing but powder in the charge.
The startled deer danced about in confusion for a few seconds,
uncertain which way to ru