322 CTJLUEN IN A FIX. 



we were perched on, and if there wasn't malice in his eye, I 

 wouldn't say so. 



" When I first saw him, I was standin' with the butt of my 

 rifle on the log, my hand graspin' the barrel, and as I caught 

 it up suddenly to load, the string of my powder-horn caught 

 between the muzzle and the ramrod, broke, and the horn 

 fell to the ground. Here was. a fix for a hunter to be in. 

 My rule was empty, and every grain of powder I had in the 

 world was in the horn, fifteen feet below me, on the ground. 

 To go down after it was a thing I was principled agin 

 undertaking considerin' the circumstance of that bull moose 

 with his great horns and the onpleasant temper he seemed 

 to be in. What to do I didn't know. I hollered and 

 shouted at the kritter, thinkin', maybe, that the voice of a 

 human might scare him ; but it only made him madder, and 

 every time I hollered he charged under the log more furi- 

 ously than before. I threw my huntin' cap at him, but he 

 pitched into it, and if he didn't trample it into the ground, 

 as if it was a human, you may shoot me. After a while, he 

 got tired of dashiu' back and forth, under the log, and took 

 a stand two or three rods off, and as he eyed us, shook his 

 great horns and stamped with his big hoofs, as much as to 

 eay, ' very well, gentlemen, I can wait, don't hurry your- 

 selves, take your time ; but I shall stay here as long as you 

 stay up there. And when you do come down, we'll take a turn 

 that won't be pleasant to some of us.' Crop and I took the 

 hint and sat still, thinkin' maybe he'd get over his pet and 

 move off ; but he did'nt lean that way at all. He seemed 



