An Elk-Hunt at Two-Ocean Pass. 189 



crash. This was on the birthday of my eldest small son ; 

 so I took him home the horns, "for his very own." On: 

 the way back that afternoon I shot off the heads of two 

 blue grouse, as they perched in the pines. 



That evening the storm broke, and the weather be- 

 came clear and very cold, so that the snow made the 

 frosty mountains gleam like silver. The moon was full, 

 and in the flood of light the wild scenery round our camp 

 was very beautiful. As always where we camped for sev- 

 eral days, we had fixed long tables and settles, and were 

 most comfortable ; and when we came in at nightfall, or 

 sometimes long afterward, cold, tired, and hungry, it was 

 sheer physical delight to get warm before the roaring fire 

 of pitchy stumps, and then to feast ravenously on bread 

 and beans, on stewed or roasted elk venison, on grouse 

 and sometimes trout, and flapjacks with maple syrup. 



Next morning dawned clear and cold, the sky a glori- 

 ous blue. Woody and I started to hunt over the great 

 table-land, and led our stout horses up the mountain-side, 

 by elk-trails so bad that they had to climb like goats. All 

 these elk-trails have one striking peculiarity. They lead 

 through thick timber, but every now and then send off 

 short, well-worn branches to some cliff-edge or jutting 

 crag, commanding a view far and wide over the country 

 beneath. Elk Jove to stand on these lookout points, and 

 scan the valleys and mountains round about. 



Blue grouse rose from beside our path ; Clarke's crows 

 flew past us, with a hollow, flapping sound, or lit in the 

 pine-tops, calling and flirting their tails ; the gray-clad 

 whisky-jacks, with multitudinous cries, hopped and flut- 



