It was October, a still golden, fulfilling season of the year; and everywhere in the vast dark green a glorious blaze of oak and aspen made beautiful contrast.

He carried his rifle, but he never used it.

He would climb miles and go this way and that with no object in view.

Yet his eye and ear had never been keener.

Hours he would spend on a promontory, watching the distance, where the golden patches of aspen shone bright out of dark-green mountain slopes.