198 THE WILDERNESS HUNTER. 



CHAPTER X. 



AN ELK-HUNT AT TWO-OCEAN PASS. 



IN September, 1891, with my ranch-partner, 

 Ferguson, I made an elk-hunt in north- 

 western Wyoming among the Shoshone Moun- 

 tains, where they join the Hoodoo and Abso- 

 raka ranges. There is no more beautiful 

 game-country in the United States. It is a 

 park land, where glades, meadows, and high 

 mountain pastures break the evergreen forest ; 

 a forest which is open compared to the tangled 

 density of the woodland farther north. It is 

 a high, cold region of many lakes and clear 

 rushing streams. The steep mountains are 

 generally of the rounded form so often seen 

 in the ranges of the Cordilleras of the United 

 States ; but the Koodoos, or Goblins, are. 

 carved in fantastic and extraordinary shapes ; 

 while the Tetons, a group of isolated rock- 

 peaks, show a striking boldness in their lofty 

 outlines. 



This was one of the pleasantest hunts I 

 ever made. As always in the mountains, save 

 where the country is so rough and so densely 

 wooded that one must go a-foot, we had a 

 pack-train ; and we took a more complete 

 outfit than we had ever before taken on such 

 a hunt, and so travelled in much comfort. 

 Usually when in the mountains I have merely 



