HOMEWARD BOUND 261 



caribou seems to me the most stupid and the 

 easiest to bag under ordinary circumstances. 



I had a special permit to shoot five stags, 

 but only shot four, not counting the deer we 

 had to shoot for meat, generally hinds. 



We soon had the meat in the canoes. The 

 brooks and shallow steadies were now full up 

 from the heavy rains, so we poled where we had 

 to portage coming in. The rain was falling 

 in torrents. We saw our last stag as we came 

 up to Red Hill Pond, but he had no head to 

 speak of. By 4.30 we reached Red Hill Pond, 

 which was up over two feet. The rain was so 

 bad we decided to camp, and soon had a fire as 

 big as a house going, before which we dried our- 

 selves; the men just as cheerful as if it had 

 been bright sunshine. It was an awful night, 

 a gale tearing through the tops of the trees, 

 and the rain coming down in sheets; but the 

 morning of the 23rd was fine, as the wind had 

 come round to the north, and we made an 

 early start as we hoped to reach Ryan's by 

 nightfall. I had had bad luck; I had seen 

 and stalked forty-two stags and never saw one 

 really good head. I think it must have been 

 a bad year for heads, or Millais, Lumsden, 

 Legge and Littledale had cleared the best stags 

 off the ground. A party of Americans had 



come over from the east the previous year, but 

 S3 



