164 SPORT IN NORTH AMERICA. 



THE MOOSE. 



Canada is the country for sport. The unculti- 

 vated steppes to the north of Quebec and Montreal 

 are peopled by half- civilised Red Skins, who live 

 only on the produce of their hunting and fishing. 

 For a thorough sportsman there is no country more 

 attractive. It was about Christmas, 1844, when I 

 first visited Canada. A friend of mine, a captain 

 in the service of Queen Victoria, had invited me to 

 visit him. 



A few days after my arrival at Quebec, Captain 

 McLean proposed that we should go and hunt 

 moose {Alces Malchis). I was nothing loth, and 

 we soon completed our preparations for the expe- 

 dition. The captain had made an appointment 

 with some Indians from St. Anne, an arrange- 

 ment which secured the services of the four best 

 hunters in their tribe, who w^ere to join us about 

 sixty miles from Quebec at a. rendezvous appointed 

 by themselves, on -the very limits of Border- 

 land. "We started one morning at daybreak in a 

 low car, drawn by a pair of mustangs, harnessed 

 in tandem. A sleigh drawn by a single horse fol- 

 lowed' us, bearing our arms, provisions, and what- 

 ever else was necessary to encamp in the Canadian 



