Still-Hunting Elk. 2 93 



den, we determined to beat through the woods and try to 

 start him up. Accordingly Merrifield, the teamster, and 

 myself took parallel courses some three hundred yards 

 apart, and started at one end to walk through to the 

 other. I doubt if the teamster much wished to meet a 

 bear alone (while nothing would have given Merrifield 

 more hearty and unaffected enjoyment than to have en- 

 countered an entire family), and he gradually edged in 

 pretty close to me. Where the woods became pretty open 

 I saw him suddenly lift his rifle and fire, and immediately 

 afterwards a splendid bull elk trotted past in front of me, 

 evidently untouched, the teamster having missed. The 

 elk ran to the other side of two trees that stood close 

 together some seventy yards off, and stopped for a moment 

 to look round. Kneeling down I fired at the only part of 

 his body I could see between the two trees, and sent a 

 bullet into his flank. Away he went, and I after, running 

 in my moccasins over the moss and pine needles for all 

 there was in me. If a wounded elk gets fairly started he 

 will go at a measured trot for many hours, and even if 

 mortally hurt may run twenty miles before falling ; while 

 at the same time he does not start off at full speed, and 

 will often give an active hunter a chance for another shot 

 as he turns and changes his course preparatory to taking a 

 straight line. So I raced along after the elk at my very 

 best speed for a few hundred feet, and then got another 

 shot as he went across a little glade, injuring his hip some- 

 what. This made it all right for me, and another hundred 

 yards' burst took me up to where I was able to put a ball 

 in a fatal spot, and the grand old fellow sank down and 

 fell over on his side. 



