238 THE WILDERNESS HUNTER. 



of all, especially when used as webbing for 

 snow-shoes. 



The moose is very fond of frequenting 

 swampy woods throughout the summer, and 

 indeed late into the fall. These swampy 

 woods are not necessarily in the lower valleys, 

 some being found very high among the 

 mountains. By preference it haunts those 

 containing lakes, where it can find the long 

 lily-roots of which it is so fond, and where it 

 can escape the torment of the mosquitoes and 

 deer-flies by lying completely submerged save 

 for its nostrils. It is a bold and good swim- 

 mer, readily crossing lakes of large size; but 

 it is of course easily slain if discovered by 

 canoe-men while in the water. It travels 

 well through bogs, but not as well as the 

 caribou ; and it will not venture on ice at all 

 if it can possibly avoid it. 



After the rut begins the animals roam 

 everywhere through the woods; and where 

 there are hardwood forests the winter-yard is 

 usually made among them, on high ground, 

 away from the swamps. In the mountains 

 the deep snows drive the moose, like all 

 other game, down to the lower valleys, in 

 hard winters. In the summer it occasionally 

 climbs to the very summits of the wooded 

 ranges, to escape the flies; and it is said that 

 in certain places where wolves are plenty the 

 cows retire to the tops of the mountains to 

 calve. More often, however, they select 

 some patch of very dense cover, in a swamp 

 or by a lake, for this purpose. Their ways of 

 life of course vary with the nature of the 

 country they frequent. In the towering 



