120 THE MOOSE 



his wisdom by commissioning me to write the life 

 story of a moose, which meant, inter alia, something 

 of the Uves of beasts met by the way ; but at no 

 stage in the arrangements did I undertake to pro- 

 duce first-hand knowledge of what hibernating 

 bears do with themselves once they are comfortably 

 fastened up for the winter. Though all argument 

 is against the paw-licking idea, all belief is for it. 

 And that is as far as we can safely go. 



As the young moose got up to feed he found 

 that a sharp frost had made the snow firm and 

 crackling, and that his big hoofs left sharp im- 

 prints. Presently he struck the trail of a couple of 

 lynxes whose diary of the night was also traced 

 upon the snow, partly covered, but not sufficiently 

 to obliterate the details of how a red fox died. 

 Very little of him was left to tell the story. Just 

 his splendid brush, which rolled over and over in 

 the wind, and a few gruesome scraps for whose 

 possession the ravens fought. 



A piece of bark gnawed from off a cottonwood 

 struck the moose lightly, and brought him up 

 pondering. A marten, perhaps, in the high tops, 

 or an overloaded squirrel getting in last supplies. 



Making no attempt to get away or to obliterate 



