214 With Rod and Gun in New England 



attention. Finally, having floundered around among the hummocks for 

 several hours, we left the big barren and, after a most heartrending tramp 

 through a thick growth of stunted spruce, emerged upon the little barren. 

 For a time nothing was to be seen. At my suggestion John climbed a 

 tree and carefully scanned the glittering expanse. Suddenly he uttered 

 a gutteral exclamation in his native tongue, slid down the tree at such a 

 pace that he brought with him a shower of broken twigs and branches, 

 and then whispered, hoarsely : 



" By tunders ! nine, 'leven, twenty-five caribou comin' down wind like 

 railroad. Lookout"! 



The information, though slightly indefinite, was in nowise premature. 

 I had just sufficient time to grasp my rifle and blow the snow from the 

 sights, when a living storm of irresponsible energy seemed to burst upon 

 the dense, low-lying thicket of barren spruce directly in our front, and a 

 drove of caribou, enveloped in a whirling cloud of snow, swept by us 

 within thirty feet at a tremendous rate of speed. I fired automatically 

 without picking out any particular animal, and one of the drove, a young 

 buck with horns that were scarcely more than spikes, dropped in his 

 tracks. At the sound of the rifle a curious transformation scene took 

 place. The entire herd, numbering about fifteen, came to an instanta- 

 neous halt and wheeled and faced us like a rank of soldiers. I drew a 

 quick but confident bead on the patriarch of the herd when, as if by magic, 

 the rank dissolved into nebulous patches of white and gray, and with 

 cracking hoofs and scuts erect the herd disappeared as suddenly and 

 almost as mysteriously as they came, scattering the light snow in clouds 

 behind them. Leaving John to dress the young buck, I followed in the 

 wake of the caribou and, about a quarter of a mile away, found the patri- 

 arch as dead as a last year's almanac. He had fallen into a kind of 

 depression between a granite bowlder and an upturned root, and had 

 broken his right horn off at the base. 



A week or so after this, when our trophies were being hauled out on 

 the tote-road, the other horn was jolted from its place, showing that the 

 animal would have shed his antlers in due course within a few days of the 

 time he was shot, had he been permitted to live so long. These caribou 

 were killed on the 8th day of December. John stated that on November 

 '20th, three years before, he had seen three bull caribou in a herd near 

 Bald mountain, on the upper waters of the Nor'-West Miramichi. One of 

 these caribou retained both of his horns intact, one had dropped a horn, 

 and the third had dropped both of them. 



