MOOSE HUNTING AND CALLING. 195 



to tell me of the fact, I fear I was rather sceptical, in 

 spite of his promising to lead me to the tracks in the 

 morning the more so as the night, which had just 

 fallen, gave promise of snow. The end of the matter 

 was that at ten o'clock that night the indefatigable Ed 

 and I, accompanied by our French- Canadian cook, 

 broke the thin ice on the lake and went off in the canoe 

 to find the tracks and to verify the story by lantern- 

 light. It is but fair to say that we did find huge slots, 

 and spent the next day in following them up. So far 

 the cook proved himself a man of his word, but in the 

 matter of the size of the bull's horns he erred strangely. 

 Perhaps they are bigger now, for they have had time to 

 grow. 



I often wondered at, and often regretted, the pro 

 hibition which obtains all over America against the use 

 of dogs in moose hunting. I do not mean by this the 

 use of a pack or of a single loose hound, such as in 

 Sweden is used to run down and bay the great deer, but 

 I refer to the harnessed hound of Norway. There, as is 

 well known, 90 per cent, of all the elk killed annually 

 are killed over dogs. The presence of a hound adds 

 enormously to the enjoyment of the hunter, and as the 

 animal is on leash it certainly does not frighten or disturb 

 the elk or do any damage. 



A blank day in America, spent as it must be in 

 walking over the endless hardwood ridges, is a dull 

 affair, the more especially as the hunter knows that luck 

 rather than skill is needed to crown his efforts. But a 

 blank day in Norway may be full of excitement, for 

 there the hound is a living barometer, giving warning of 

 the nearness of the elk, which he can wind at a great 

 distance, often leading the hunter to a fresh track a mile 



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