Still-Hunting Elk. 279 



his own hand. The teamster went up stream, Merrifield 

 went down, while I followed the tracks of the band of 

 cows and calves that we had started in the morning ; their 

 trail led along the wooded hill-crests parallel to the stream, 

 and therefore to Merrifield's course. The crests of the 

 hills formed a wavy-topped but continuous ridge between 

 two canyon-like valleys, and the sides fell off steeper and 

 steeper the farther down stream I went, until at last they 

 were broken in places by sheer precipices and cliffs ; the 

 groves of trees too, though with here and there open 

 glades, formed a continuous forest of tall pines. There 

 was a small growth of young spruce and other ever- 

 green, thick enough to give cover, but not to interfere 

 with seeing and shooting to some distance. The pine 

 trunks rose like straight columns, standing quite close 

 together ; and at their bases the ground was carpeted 

 with the sweet-scented needles, over which, in my 

 moccasined feet, I trod without any noise. It was 

 but a little past noon, and the sun in the open was 

 very hot ; yet underneath the great archways of the 

 pine woods the air though still was cool, and the 

 sunbeams that struggled down here and there through the 

 interlacing branches, and glinted on the rough trunks, only 

 made bright spots in what was elsewhere the uniform, 

 grayish half-light of the mountain forest. Game trails 

 threaded the woods in all directions, made for the most part 

 by the elk. These animals, when not disturbed, travel 

 strung out in single file, each one stepping very nearly in 

 the tracks of the one before it ; they are great wanderers, 

 going over an immense amount of country during the 



