NEAR MIDDLE RIDGE. 127 



for time was growing short. November was upon us and 

 the stags would soon be dropping their horns. 



Although we had been covering much of the same ground 

 where I had, during the year before, seen such numbers 

 of deer and secured fine trophies, I was now much less 

 fortunate. I saw no more than a quarter of the number 

 of caribou, and the heads were disappointing, but this could 

 partially be accounted for by the fact that the previous 

 winter and spring in Newfoundland had been exceptionally 

 cold and severe, and in consequence the antlers did not grow, 

 in most cases, to their usual dimensions. But even in these 

 " lean years," of which 1904 and 1905 are good examples, 

 there are always a certain proportion of stags whose horns 

 are so massive that they seem, in some degree at any rate, 

 to defy the result of adverse weather. We began by making 

 a circle to get the wind in our favour, and as we passed out 

 from behind just such another clump of spruce trees as that 

 in which our camp was set we saw before us an undulating 

 upland covered with snow which had drifted among a 

 dwarf growth of spruce and their kind. Just upon the 

 hither side of the sky-line a little band of caribou were lying 

 down. There were seven of them in all, and two appeared 

 to be mature stags. Up to that time the necks of stags 

 had always shone out white against the yellow of the marshes 

 or the claret-coloured moss and leafage of the barrens, but 

 the animals we were now looking at appeared of a dirty 

 ivory against the pure background of snow. It was not 

 until we had approached within shot that I saw that neither 

 stag carried antlers of any great size. We were about to 

 turn aside, intending to leave the animals undisturbed, 

 when the tops of the horns of another stag rose over the 

 sky-line. Soon the stag himself appeared, and after standing 

 for a moment he began walking down towards us. Lying 

 as we were in a patch of spruces, none of which were more 

 than two feet high, we were nevertheless quite invisible 



