Fifty Years a Hunter and Trapper: Autobiography, experiences and observations of Eldred Nathaniel Woodcock during his fifty years of hunting and trapping.Woodcock, E. N. (Eldred Nathaniel)
General
Fifty Years a Hunter and Trapper: Autobiography, experiences and observations of Eldred Nathaniel Woodcock during his fifty years of hunting and trapping.
Woodcock, E. N. (Eldred Nathaniel)
Hunting; Trapping
Now about this time I had killed a deer in the big woods where
several of us had been on a fishing trip and I took a piece of this
venison to a friend in town. It so happened that one of the side
judges of our court (Stebens by name) was at the house of my friend.
A few days later I was in a store belonging to a brother of the
Judge, when the Judge came in and accused me of killing the white
deer. Of course I denied, and told the Judge that I would wager two
dollars that the white deer was still living. The Judge said "Very
well," and at the same time handed a two dollar bill to a man
standing by, by the name of Abison, who was listening to our
conversation, which was quite heated. I told the Judge at the very
first opportunity I would kill the white deer.
The white deer was not seen in the woods any more, and I was charged
with killing it. I said nothing in regard to the charge, for I had
now made up my mind to kill it if I could. One day three or four
weeks after I had made the wager, Mr. Abison came to me and handed me
two dollars and said that the Judge had got his money and told him to
give me my money back as he (the Judge) did not want to take the
money, that I had killed the white deer all right.
Now I was quite positive that the Judge had learned that the white
deer was still alive. I had heard that the white deer had again been
seen in a field near town. Now this made me all the more determined
to kill the white deer. I will explain that I had learned that
several of the sportsmen of Coudersport, the Judge included, had had
dogs after the white deer several times the previous fall, but it so
happened that there were no watchers at the place where the deer came
to the creek.
That fall as soon as the first snow fell I went after the deer. I did
not strike the trail until quite late in the afternoon, and as the
deer left the woods where it had been accustomed to staying and went
into the big woods farther south, I left the trail for that day. I
would have got a shot at the deer if my attention had not been called
in the wrong direction by the chirping of several blue jays which I
thought were excited over the presence of the white deer.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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