182 CRUISINGS IN THE CASCADES 



immense size and weight, often ascends to heights 

 that seem incredible. He may often be found away 

 up to timber line, and will traverse narrow passes 

 and defiles, climbing over walls of rock and through 

 fissures where it would seem impossible for so large 

 an animal, with such massive antlers as he carries, 

 to go. He chooses his route, however, with rare 

 good judgment, and all mountaineers know that an 

 elk trail is the best that can possibly be selected 

 over any given section of mountainous country. 

 His faculty of traversing dense jungles and wind- 

 falls is equally astonishing. If given his own time, 

 he will move quietly and easily through the worst of 

 these, leaping over logs higher than his back as 

 gracefully and almost as lightly as the deer; yet let 

 a herd of elk be alarmed and start on a run through 

 one of these labyrinthine masses, and they will make 

 a noise like a regiment of cavalry on a precipitous 

 charge. 



I have stood on the margin of a quaking-asp 

 thicket and heard a large band of elk coming 

 toward me that had been "jumped" and fired upon 

 by my friend at the other side, and the frightful 

 noise of their horns pounding the trees, their hoofs 

 striking each other and the numerous rocks, the 

 crashing of dead branches, with the snorting of the 

 affrighted beasts, might well have struck terror to 

 the heart of anyone unused to such sights and 

 sounds, and have caused him to seek safety in 

 flight. But by standing my ground I was enabled 

 to get in a couple of shots at short range, and to 

 bring down two of the finest animals in the herd. 



The whistle of the elk is a sound which many 



