ion of time, to hold the white bead of your
rifle motionless and to press the trigger. It has to be done VERY
steadily, at that distance,--and you out of breath, with your nerves
keyed high in the tension of such caution."

"NOW what are you talking about?" she broke in helplessly.

"Oh, didn't I mention it?" I asked, surprised. "I was telling you why I
could bear to shoot deer."

"Yes, but--" she began.

"Of course not," I reassured her. "After all, it's very simple. The
reason I can bear to kill deer is because, to kill deer, you must
accomplish a skillful elimination of the obvious."

My young lady was evidently afraid of being considered stupid; and also
convinced of her inability to understand what I was driving at. So she
temporized in the manner of society.

"I see," she said, with an air of complete enlightenment.

Now of course she did not see. Nobody could see the force of that last
remark without the grace of further explanation, and yet in the
elimination of the obvious rests the whole secret of seeing deer in the
woods.

In traveling the trail you will notice two things: that a tenderfoot
will habitually contemplate the horn of his saddle or the trail a few
yards ahead of his horse's nose, with occasionally a look about at the
landscape; and the old-timer will be constantly searching the prospect
with keen understanding eyes. Now in the occasional glances the
tenderfoot takes, his perceptions have room for just so many
impressions. When the number is filled out he sees nothing more.
Naturally the obvious features of the landscape supply the basis for
these impressions. He sees the configuration of the mountains, the
nature of their covering, the course of their ravines, first of all.
Then if he looks more closely, there catches his eye an odd-shaped
rock, a burned black stub, a flowering bush, or some such matter.
Anything less striking in its appeal to the attention actually has not
room for its recognition. In other words, supposing that a man has the
natural ability to receive x visual impressions, the tenderfoot fills
out his full capacity with the striking features of his surroundings.
To be able to see anything more obscure in form or color, he must
naturally put aside from his attention some one or another of these
obvious features. He can, for example, look for a particular kind of
flower on a side hill only by refusing to see other kinds.

If this is plain, then, go one step furt