Mountain Game. 115 



companion's skill as a tracker enabled us to find them 

 again. There was a spell of warm weather which brought 

 out a few of the big bull-dog flies, which drive a horse 

 or indeed a man nearly frantic ; we were in the haunts 

 of these dreaded and terrible scourges, which up to the 

 beginning of August render it impossible to keep stock 

 of any description unprotected where they abound, but 

 which are never formidable after the first frost. In many 

 parts of the wilderness these pests, or else the incredible 

 swarms of mosquitoes, blackflies, and buffalo gnats, render 

 life not worth living during the last weeks of spring and 

 the early months of summer. 



There were elk and deer in the neighborhood ; also 

 ruffed, blue, and spruce grouse ; so that our camp was soon 

 stocked with meat. Early one morning while Willis was 

 washing in the brook, a little black bear thrust its sharp 

 nose through the alders a few feet from him, and then 

 hastily withdrew and was seen no more. The smaller 

 wild-folk were more familiar. As usual in the northern 

 mountains, the gray moose-birds and voluble, nervous little 

 chipmunks made themselves at home in the camp. Parties 

 of chickadees visited us occasionally. A family of flying 

 squirrels lived overhead in the grove ; and at nightfall 

 they swept noiselessly from tree to tree, in long graceful 

 curves. There were sparrows of several kinds moping 

 about in the alders ; and now and then one of them would 

 sing a few sweet, rather mournful bars. 



After several days' preliminary exploration we started 

 on foot for white goat. We took no packs with us, each 

 carrying merely his jacket, with a loaf of bread and a 

 paper of salt thrust into the pockets. Our aim was to get 



