178 HUNTING ADVENTURES. 



moital wound as :t approaches, he shelters himself from its f ry 

 behind a tree, and I have heard of several instances in which the 

 enraged animal has completely stripped the bark from the trunk 

 of a large tree by striking with its fore-feet. In the spring-time, 

 when the snow is very deep, the hunters frequently run down the 

 noose on snow-shoes. An instance is recorded in the narrative 

 of Captain Franklin's second journey, where three hunters pur- 

 sued a moose-deer for four successive days, until the footsteps of 

 the chase were marked with blood, although they had not yet got 

 a view of it. At this period of the pursuit the principal hunter 

 had the misfortune to sprain his ankle, and the two others were 

 tired out ; but one of them, having rested for twelve hours, set 

 out again, and succeeded in killing the animal after a further pur- 

 suit of two days' continuance. Notwithstanding the lengthened 

 chase which the moose can sustain when pursued in the snow, 

 Hearne remarks that it is both tender-footed and short-winded ; 

 and that, were it found in a country free from underwood, and 

 dry under foot, it would become an easy prey to horsemen and 

 dogs. The same author informs us that in the summer moose- 

 deer are often killed in the water by the Indians who have the 

 fortune to surprise them while they are crossing rivers or lakes, 

 and that at such times they are the most inoffensive of animals, 

 never making any resistance. 



" The young ones in particular," says he, "are so simple, that 

 I remember to have seen an Indian paddle his canoe up to one of 

 them, and take it by the poll, without experiencing the least oppo- 

 sition, the poor harmless animal seeming at the same time as con- 

 tented alongside the canoe as if swimming by the side of its dam, 

 and looking up in our faces with the same fearless innocence that 

 a house-lamb would, making use of its fore foot almost every 

 instant to clear its eyes of musquitoes, which at that time were 

 remarkably numerous. The moose is the easiest to tame and 

 domesticate of any of the deer kind.'' 



