82 PRAIRIE AND FOREST. 



ter, was much to be dreaded, and in corroboration inform- 

 ed me of a little tragedy that occurred some years past in 

 the same neighborhood. Two friends once trapped the 

 township of Success. They had two beats, running in re- 

 verse directions, while the shanty in which they both lived 

 together was situated at the dividing point from which each 

 radiated. The one who examined the traps to the north 

 to-day visited those to the south to-morrow, changing their 

 routes with each other daily, and always meeting at night at 

 their common residence. Almost half the season had thus 

 passed away, when one of the companions who had return- 

 ed to the sleeping-place became seriously alarmed at the 

 continued absence of his friend. At length the little cur 

 dog who constantly accompanied the missing man came 

 home alone. There is an end to every thing, and so there 

 is to a long winter night ; and with the earliest indications 

 of day the anxious watcher sallied forth to find the missing 

 trapper, whom he, after a long and weary search, discover- 

 ed, dreadfully mangled, and partially eaten. The assassin 

 had been a painter. The tracks on the tell-tale snow spoke 

 correctly. About thirty feet above where the corpse lay, 

 an immense limb ran out at right angles from the parent 

 tree. From this the skulking coward had doubtless sprung ' 

 upon the unsuspecting trapper. 



Thus it will be seen that the home of the giant moose is 

 not without other tenants, some of whom are likely to af- 

 ford adventurous hunters more excitement than a hot cor- 

 ner at the side of an English cover. 



