190 The Wilderness Hunter. 



tered near us. Snow-shoe rabbits scuttled away, the 

 big furry feet which give them their name already turn- 

 ing white. At last we came out on the great plateau, 

 seamed with deep, narrow ravines. Reaches of pasture 

 alternated with groves and open forests of varying size. 

 Almost immediately we heard the bugle of a bull elk, and 

 saw a big band of cows and calves on the other side of a 

 valley. There were three bulls with them, one very large, 

 and we tried to creep up on them ; but the wind was baf- 

 fling and spoiled our stalk. So we returned to our horses, 

 mounted them, and rode a mile farther, toward a large 

 open wood on a hill-side. When within two hundred 

 yards we heard directly ahead the bugle of a bull, and 

 pulled up short. In a moment I saw him walking through 

 an open glade ; he had not seen us. The slight breeze 

 brought us down his scent. Elk have a strong character- 

 istic smell ; it is usually sweet, like that of a herd of Al- 

 derney cows ; but in old bulls, while rutting, it is rank, 

 pungent, and lasting. We stood motionless till the bull 

 was out of sight,, then stole to the wood, tied our horses, 

 and trotted after him. He was travelling fast, occasion- 

 ally calling ; whereupon others in the neighborhood would 

 answer. Evidently he had been driven out of some herd 

 by the master bull. 



He went faster than we did, and while we were vainly 

 trying to overtake him we heard another very loud and 

 sonorous challenge to our left. It came from a ridge- 

 crest at the edge of the woods, among some scattered 

 clumps of the northern nut-pine or pinyon a queer coni- 

 fer, growing very high on the mountains, its multiforked 



