THE FRIENDLY ARCTIC 583 



could always kill that one. He told me that the latter part of 

 the summer his party had scarcely ever been more than ten yards 

 away when shooting and commonly enough the powder would singe 

 the hair. The animal stood with lowered head and the bullet 

 could be placed in the back of the neck just at the base of the horns, 

 resulting in instant death and clean butchering. 



Occasionally, perhaps frightened by something else, a herd will 

 run away on the first approach of danger. If they start running 

 they are more difficult to overtake than caribou, which seldom run 

 more than eight miles. But commonly when ovibos are alarmed 

 they will run to the top of the nearest small knoll and make a 

 defensive formation spoken of as a circle or a square, although I 

 have seen triangles and various irregular formations. Usually the 

 big animals are on the outside with the calves in the center. When 

 there are two they will stand tail to tail and when three they make 

 a three-pointed star. If danger is approaching from one side only 

 they may form in two or three lines with the biggest animals in the 

 front rank and the smallest in the rear. Their central idea is one 

 of defense though they may charge upon occasion. Two animals 

 may charge together but I have never seen a whole band do so, 

 nor have I heard of it. Usually they charge singly, each one mak- 

 ing a short rush of from ten to fifteen yards, then whirling rapidly, 

 running back to the herd, facing about once more, and backing 

 into line. 



Besides the most obvious reason for killing an entire herd instead 

 of several animals out of each herd, there are the following ad- 

 vantages: 



The animals stand in such close formation that you can rarely 

 be sure of killing one without wounding others. These wounded 

 animals would probably later die or become a prey to wolves. 



If the big animals of a herd are killed the remaining calves and 

 yearlings would probably be unable to defend themselves and would 

 be killed by some band of wolves. 



Wolves and bears are continually prowling about and if you 

 have meat depots in many places they cannot all be guarded, but 

 when a large number of animals are killed in one place you can have 

 a man camping beside the kill until all the meat has been hauled 

 home. 



You also want the whole herd because of the various qualities 

 of the meat. The biggest animals are commonly fattest and the 

 fat is precious, but the meat of these is often very tough and not 

 so suitable for human food as that of the younger animals. I have 



