264 HUNTING CAMPS. 



and spent a good deal of time hunting in the green 

 timber. One day, when out with Ed, I heard some 

 shots, and on returning to camp, found that Howard had 

 killed a splendid stag, with horns that for length and 

 beauty could scarcely be equalled in that part of the 

 country. He was hunting with Ross and Gagnon, and 

 all of them were watching a savanne, when a herd of 

 upwards of thirty caribou, including no less than five 

 stags, suddenly came out of the woods. Of the five 

 stags, two were far superior to the rest, the one which 

 Howard killed, and another, at which Ross only just 

 failed to get a shot, and which made off into the dense 

 woods. This latter had, they told me, a very sym- 

 metrical head with one brow shovel at least, and very 

 nicely developed bays and tops. Both described it as 

 carrying quite as fine a head as the one Howard secured. 

 With any luck Ross should have had an excellent chance 

 of shooting this stag, but it was frightened off by the 

 loud untimely cries of triumph with which their French 

 attendant hailed the fall of the caribou killed by 

 Howard. 



After this, I went out for two or three days without 

 gaining a glimpse of any deer, and none of the party 

 were more fortunate, so that we began to fear that the 

 big stag which they had seen must have moved off' into 

 another district. At last, on the 30th of September, Ed 

 and I, travelling to the furthest point from camp, found 

 a hillside which was covered with moose-sign, and there 

 on the following day Ross and Ed saw two moose, 

 one of which Ross killed, the other Ed wounded 

 and lost. Ross's moose head showed a spread of forty- 

 eight inches, and carried a good, even head. 



On the 2nd of October I went out alone and spent a day 



