Page:Thirty-One Years on the Plains and in the Mountains.djvu/44

36 I shouldered my rifle and had not gone far when I heard the turkeys, up the river. Then I took the quill and started my turkey tune. Directly a big old gobbler came strutting towards me and I called him up as near to me as he would come, for I wanted to make sure of him.

Uncle Kit had told me about the "buck-ague" and I knew I had it when I tried to draw a bead on that big gobbler. I had never shot at a living thing, and when I leveled my rifle it was impossible to control my nerves.

The turkey seemed to jump up and down, and appeared to me to be as big as a pony, when I looked at him along the rifle. Two or three times I tried to hold the bead on him, but could not. Now I wouldn't have missed killing him for