ELK, WAPITI. 69 



will in a short time return to his accustomed haunts, the Elk and 

 Mule Deer will almost immediately desert a country where they 

 have been much shot at, and the sound of a gun, even though at 

 a great distance, will alarm all the bands within hearing. For this 

 reason, hunters, in the mountains where the report of a gun is 

 taken up, and a thousand times repeated by the echoes, use a rifle 

 which carries but a small charge of powder, as the Smith and 

 Wesson rifle or the Winchester ; stating that the needle gun with 

 its 70 grains of powder makes too much noise, frightening, or at 

 least rendering suspicious all the game in the neighborhood. Old 

 hunters have a saying, that a band of Elk when fairly started, will 

 not stop until they have crossed flowing water ; and a plainsman 

 of experience and reliability, in whose company we have often 

 hunted, said to us once, as a noble band of Elk disappeared over 

 the bluffs, on the north bank of the Loup Fork ; " those fellows 

 won't stop until they have crossed the Running Water." This 

 stream, perhaps better known in the " States " as the Niobrara, 

 was forty miles distant, yet we doubt not that the Elk were able 

 to keep up their swift trot until they reached that stream. 



The usual gait of the Elk, when much alarmed, is the long 

 swinging trot before referred to, which is a far more rapid gait 

 than would be imagined by one who has had no experience of the 

 rate at which these animals move. A very good horse will have 

 great difficulty in keeping up vvith a trotting Elk unless the coun- 

 try is exceptionally favorable. The Elk, however, cares nothing for 

 the character of the ground which it traverses, or rather seems to 

 prefer that which is worst for a horse. It apparently moves quite 

 as fast through the most rugged Bad Lands, or along the side of a 

 mountain, rough with huge rocks and down timber, as over the 

 smoothly undulating prairies of the open country. Moreover this 

 trot does not seem to tire it at all, and it can keep up the gait for 

 an indefinite length of time. Its run, and it only runs when very 

 badly frightened, is an awkward clumsy gallop, utterly devoid of 

 grace, but somewhat swifter than its trot. Running however is 

 very exhausting to the animal, and an essential to success in pur- 

 suing the Elk on horseback is to get him to break his trot. If that 

 can be done and the country favors the horse, the hunter may 

 succeed in getting along side. The writer remembers on one occa- 



