152 THE MOOSE 



at distances sufficient to keep a wolf or fox sniffing 

 around until the poison should have had time to 

 do its work. Farther, a frightful whiff heralded 

 the outline of an ingeniously made stockade, baited 

 with rotten fish smeared over with castoreum, 

 which concealed a noose for snaring lynx. 



Death and destruction loomed on every side. 



A black fox, with not a rusty hair upon him, 

 but a few of shining silver at the tip of his fine 

 brush, lay crouching beside an upright stick rubbed 

 over with the fatally attractive beaver castor, with 

 his right fore-foot caught in a small steel -jawed 

 trap lying buried beneath the snow. 



He represented in all his rarity and prime condi- 

 tion the fortune of a trapper's lifetime, seeing that 

 his market price, even at a trading-post, would top 

 a thousand dollars. 



Cunning and adroit as he was, seldom to be 

 taken in by any sophistry of man, the beautiful 

 beast had missed his way for once ! 



He looked up with a shrinking terror in his eyes 

 as the big deer lumbered slowly by, and some- 

 thing in his forlorn attitude drew Moosewa to 

 him. The fox was a prisoner, even as the young 

 moose himself had been. He would go, perhaps. 



