172 



THE SPORTSMAN'S PARADISE; 



men, and that it was only necessary to examine their 

 records to prove its feasibility. The captain said in reply 

 to this argument, "I don't believe very much in these 

 statements made in books, but I shall test this question at 

 the first opportunity." 



Here was the opportunity, and the captain was not slow 

 to avail himself of it. We started off on the trail, which 

 we followed without intermission until about two o'clock in 

 the afternoon. This trail was very circuitous. We started 

 on it about a mile from our camp, followed it about eight 

 miles, and were then within three hundred yards of our 

 tent. This morning was cloudy ; some rain fell, though not 

 enough to seriously embarrass us ; but the rainfall of the 

 previous night made the trailing of the moose more difficult 

 than it would otherwise have been. The morning's labor 

 has demonstrated the fact, to the entire satisfaction of the 

 captain and all the others in our party, that a moose may 

 be quite easily trailed without the aid of a tracking snow. 

 It is true that some difficulty is found in those cases where 

 the trails intersect each other, where the animals have 

 passed principally over rocky ground which is not covered 

 with a sufficient amount of earth-mould to receive the im- 

 pressions, and likewise in those cases where the earth is 

 covered so completely with a short, thick underbrush that 

 the animal's foot does not really come in contact with the 

 earth. 



The captain was very sceptical in regard to moose- 

 calling, and I attempted to convince him by reading from 

 Frank Forester's "Field Sports" the following: 



" Another, and yet more fatal, method by which man 



