CHAPTER XIX.
WOLF CATCHING.
This article by R. H. Winslow was originally contributed to the HUNTER-TRADER-TRAPPER, but being of special interest is reprinted here:
"It was my misfortune sometime ago to contract a nervous disorder, which quite incapacitated me. After securing the medical advice of one of the world's best specialists, it was apparent that I would find health, if at all, only in a 'journey to nature.' Accordingly I decided to leave New York and spend a year in the West, there to hunt quail, prairie chicken, wild turkey, rabbits, bob cats, wolves, deer and bear.
"At first I went to Oklahoma and from there traveled by easy stages to the Mill Iron Ranch in Northwest Texas, which I have thus far made my headquarters.
"The feathered tribe, rabbits, prairie dogs and bob cats interested me for a while, but soon my thoughts became centered on wolves. Indeed, they are extremely interesting, and I was not long in discovering that it would be necessary to cope with animals of almost human intelligence. Too, they were quite plentiful — could be seen any day while riding over the plains — and night they made hideous with their howls. Would I hunt them with horse an gun, horse an dogs, or attempt to trap them? That was the question confronting me.
A Texas Specimen.
"My first experience with horse and gun came about in this way: Two young cowboys, Ernest Edwards and Robert Russell, were with me hunting prairie chicken; we saw a wolf lying in the sage grass about five hundred yards away, and decided that although we had shot guns, we would endeavor to ride up sufficiently close to get a shot. Edwards and I were within about eighty yards of the wolf when he started; both fired, and Russell started immediately in pursuit. Russell ran after him for about three miles, when the chase was taken up by Edwards, who, upon his famous sorrel, 'Playmate,' was soon within a few yards of him and fired with his shot gun. Three shots brought him to the ground.
"After this I saw cowboys try to rope wolves, but seldom with success; and frequently they would attempt to kill them from their mounts with carbine or revolver, but were likewise seldom successful. It was not long, accordingly, before it was evident to me that very little success would attend my efforts with horse and gun.