226 The Wilderness Hunter 



park and glade, by meadow and pasture, by bare 

 hillside and barren tableland. Some five miles off 

 lay the sheet of water known to the old hunters as 

 Spotted Lake; two or three shallow, sedgy places, 

 and spots of geyser formation, made pale green 

 blotches on its wind-rippled surface. Far to the 

 southwest, in daring beauty and majesty, the grand 

 domes and lofty spires of the Tetons shot into the 

 blue sky. Too sheer for the snow to rest on their 

 sides, it yet filled the rents in their rough flanks, and 

 lay deep between the towering pinnacles of dark 

 rock. 



That night, as on more than one night afterward, 

 a bull elk came down whistling to within two or 

 three hundred yards of the tents, and tried to join 

 the horse herd. The moon had set, so I could not 

 go after it. Elk are very restless and active through- 

 out the night in the rutting season; but where un- 

 disturbed they feed freely in the daytime, resting for 

 two or three hours about noon. 



Next day, which was rainy, we spent in getting 

 in the antlers and meat of the two dead elk; and I 

 shot off the heads of two or three blue grouse on 

 the way home. The following day I killed another 

 bull elk, following him by the strong, not unpleas- 

 ing, smell, and hitting him twice as he ran, at about 

 eighty yards. So far I had had good luck, killing 

 everything I had shot at ; but now the luck changed, 

 through no fault of mine, as far as I could see, and 



