HIS FIRST WINTER 125 



In the grim, wild nights the far-sightedness of 

 the lynx — a sense said to be developed in those 

 of the tribe living in the far northern regions to 

 a much greater extent than in those inhabiting 

 Canada — was brought into fi*equent play. 



One big old male, who crossed the moose-yards 

 often on silent, snow-shod feet, hunted tirelessly, 

 regardless of the temperature. Quite fifty inches 

 long and twenty inches high, his abbreviated tail 

 spanned but a beggarly five. His neck-rufFwas long 

 and grizzled, and his tufted ears blackly pencilled — 

 an imposing and majestic beast, with the wickedness 

 of the centuries at the back of his eyes, and an 

 illustration of the name " Lucivee," which the 

 French Canadians adapted for him from hup 

 cervier (deer wolf), in every curve of his lithe 

 limbs. Something of the spring and quiver of 

 a deer lay in his elastic body, something of 

 the force and cruelty of the wolf in his cunning 

 glance. 



More silent than any other of the bush folk, it 

 was to this noiselessness, combined with his strata- 

 gems and patience, that the lynx owed his success, 

 for his sense of smell was nothing out of the 

 ordinary — rather under it, in fact. That he was 



