268 THE WILDERNESS OF THE UPPER YUKON 



September I. Early the next morning I started up 

 through the woods, and fighting my way for three hours 

 through the willows and dwarf-birch, emerged above 

 timber on the slopes of Mount Sheldon, which was cov- 

 ered with a few inches of snow. Looking up through my 

 field-glasses I saw near the crest three young sheep which 

 were very uneasy and kept nervously looking about. 

 One was a three-year-old ram, the others two-year-olds. 

 They acted in the way characteristic of young rams when 

 separated from their band. They would lie down for a 

 few moments, and then get up and look, until they moved 

 a short distance to feed. After feeding a few moments 

 they would become restless, and after looking about lie 

 down again. But they would soon rise up and move 

 nervously around. At last they went up near some cliffs 

 and lay down facing up, but they still remained nervous 

 and kept jerking their heads in all directions to maintain 

 the watch. One was quite dark in color, the other two 

 almost white. 



Circling around the slope so as not to disturb them, 

 I ascended for some distance. Ptarmigan were very 

 abundant, and the holes of ground-squirrels were every- 

 where, though some of the squirrels had retired to hiber- 

 nate. A few greeted me with familiar chatter. To the 

 south of the mountain was a vast level meadow swamp 

 extending to the lower slopes of Mount Riddell. Moose 

 signs were abundant, and I decided to move the camp up 

 to timber-line, since the long climb up through the woods 

 from the shore of the lake consumed so much time that 

 little remained for hunting. 



