<TITLE>13. Par 46-49</TITLE>L-46 I don't know whether I ever told you this little story or not; it could stand it again. Everyone knows that I hunt; I love to hunt, borned in me, can't help it. And one day, I was hunting up in the north woods with a fellow, that was a good hunter, a very fine man on track and a real good, dead shot. And he was a man you didn't have to hunt up all the time; he--he knowed where he was at in the woods. And I enjoyed hunting with him.
And we'd leave one another, and I'd say, "I'll meet you in... twenty miles over at a certain place, or so-and-so." He'd be right there. And so you never had to worry about him being turned around or lost; he was part Indian himself and knew the woods. So he...

L-47 One day I went up to hunt with him. But that was the meanest man I ever met in my life--cruel-hearted. He would--loved to shoot little fawns (That's the little baby deer.) just to make me feel bad, because I was a preacher. And he'd laugh at me, and say, "Oh, you're chicken hearted. That's what's the matter with you preachers; you're all chicken hearted."
I said, "Burt, it's not that."
He said, "I thought you was a hunter."
I said, "I'm a hunter, but I'm not a killer." I said, "I--I don't believe... I believe that's murder, just to do that for meanness."

L-48 I do not believe in killing animals like that just for targets. If there's anybody that's a murderer, it's the white man. Take him over in Africa one time, watch him; he will kill just as long as he can shoot and kill down. That's right. It's just right in him, his nature to do that. Kill out...
These poor Indians setting here, how they killed off their buffaloes and deers; just picked up bones and things, shooting them for targets. No wonder they got a bad feeling about it. God gave them--them heritage. We shot them all for targets. It's a shame, disgraced, a stain on the flag... of anything. But just to be a killer...
And that's what Burt was--he's just a killer, just killed for the fun of it, killed four or five of them in one day, just for the fun of it. One year when I went up there, he'd made a little whistle that sounded like a little baby fawn, how it squeals, you know, calling for it's mammy. And he showed it to me, and I said, "Burt, you're not going use that."
"Oh," he said, "get next to yourself, preacher." Said, "You're too chicken hearted."
And I said, "Burt, would you do that?"
"Well," he said, "just follow me and see."

L-49 We went hunting that day--about six inches of snow, good tracking weather--but deers, after they've been shot at a few times, are real wild in that country, the white-tail. They can hide and you can't see them to save your life. And they won't come out in daytime; they will not do it. So if they're ever out, you're going to get them around just break of day, or just a... before dark sets in. That's when you find them. And we'd hunted till about eleven o'clock and didn't even see one track; it was late before we went up there. And then...
The season had been in for a couple of weeks over on the north side of the road; opened up after Christmas on the south side of the--of the Presidential Range. So we was right behind Mount Washington. And when we were hunting that day, at about eleven o'clock... We usually carried some hot chocolate (got a lot of energy to it) we'd carry that with a little lunch in our back, where if we got lost or stranded, why, we could find our way around, and have something to eat to warm you up if we got too cold. It was very cold.


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