MOOSE HUNTING AND CALLING. 171 



There are persons who, having had no actual experience of 

 this, in many cases, very high form of sport, criticise 

 " calling " as an unworthy way in which to kill moose. 

 Since the day of which I write I have hunted moose in every 

 fashion that is, by still-hunting in the woods, by calling, 

 and upon the snow ; and it is my opinion that calling can 

 give the hunter a thrill almost unequalled in any other form 

 of sport. It is true that the moose comes to the hunter and 

 the hunter does not (as in the theoretically highest methods 

 of sport he should) go to the moose ; but the science and the 

 knowledge of woodcraft that can draw so shy an animal 

 to accept the caller's voice for that of his mate raises calling 

 to a high rank, at any rate for the hunter who himself uses 

 the horn. 



It must also be remembered that on such occasions the 

 moose almost invariably " comes in " on the wrong side of 

 the lake, and as the time at which he arrives is generally an 

 hour and a half or so after sunset, he is in the shadow of the 

 waterside trees, and the distance is often two hundred yards 

 or over, it thus needs a clear eye and a steady hand to save 

 oneself the sleepless night that a miss inevitably entails. 

 Moose-calling may seem to the tyro a very easy way of 

 " getting your moose/' and so once in six times no doubt it 

 is, but the reader will possibly understand my point of view 

 more clearly if, without further preamble, I go on to describe 

 the experiences which fell to my lot with the first two moose 

 that fortune sent within range of my rifle. 



About five o'clock, then, on the first evening I spent in 

 the Canadian woods Ed and I launched our canoe on the 

 little lake which we had chosen and paddled up towards the 

 head of it, where the surface of the water was green with 

 aquatic plants. 



The sun had just sunk through the tree stems, and had 

 been succeeded by the little cold wind which so often blows 

 at that hour, when we landed, and Ed, taking the horn, gave 



