The Elk of the Pacific Coast 171 



better pasturage with abundance of country in 

 the mountains that is the natural home of the 

 deer. Yet I can find no evidence of the elk ever 

 having passed south of this mysterious line, 

 though so open and so easy. The oldest Indian 

 and Mexican settlers know nothing of him even 

 by tradition, except as the great alee of the north- 

 ern plains. 



Nor does he seem to have gone into the high 

 ranges of the Sierra Nevada even in summer, 

 though nothing is wanting there that an elk 

 should desire to complete his happiness. Heavy 

 forests, broad meadows, rocky glens, secluded 

 thickets, and all that one could wish he ignored 

 to stay on the great, dry, blazing plains ; and left 

 them only for the still less attractive tule swamps. 

 No trace is found of his existence over the range 

 on the east, and strangely enough he does not 

 seem to have spent much time in the Coast 

 Range. Much less did he cross it, and scarcely 

 ever was seen on the rich slopes that roll away to 

 the silvery sea in such long swells of the finest 

 feed in the world. He appears no more until we 

 reach the great redwoods of the northern coast of 

 California, where he made his last camp. Here 

 the vast forest with its tremendous undergrowth 

 maintained him for a time, but the insatiate greed 

 of the white man for " heads " and for elk teeth 

 for watch-charms was fast consigning this grand 



