Rifle-Eye smiled at the lad.
"I don't know that I'm quite the oldest inhabitant," he said, "but I sure am the oldest Ranger in the Service, an' all I c'n say is, 'Make yerself to home.'"
"All right," said Wilbur promptly, "I'll take that as an official welcome from the Sierras, and I will. But," he added, "you were going to tell me about your hunting. I should think it would be great sport."
"Son," said Rifle-Eye somewhat sharply, "I never killed a harmless critter 'for sport,' as you call it, in my life."
"But I thought," gasped Wilbur in astonishment, "that you were hunting nearly all the time, before you started in as Ranger."
"So I was," was the quiet reply.
"But—but I don't quite see—" Wilbur stopped lamely.
"I said before," resumed the old hunter, "that I never killed a harmless critter onless I had to. Neither have I. Varmints, o' course, is a different matter. I've shot plenty o' them, an' once in a while I've had ter kill fer food. But just shootin' for the sake o' shootin' is the trick of a coward or a fool or a tenderfoot or a mixture of all three. It's plumb unnecessary, an' it's dead wrong."
"You mean shooting deer and so forth?"
"I mean just that, son, if the shootin's only fer antlers an' what these here greenhorns calls 'trophies.' If venison is needed, why, I ain't got nothin' to say. A man's life is worth more than a deer's when he needs food, but a man's conceit ain't worth more than a deer's life."