A HUNTER'S CAMP-FIRES 



lower over the opposite hardwood ridge before we called, there 

 was abundant opportunity to watch the life about the pond. 

 Trout were breaking the placid surface of the water in every 

 direction. Dragon-flies flitted here and there, and black flies 

 buzzed about our heads in bloodthirsty and tormenting swarms. 

 A red-headed woodpecker and a kingfisher were plying their 

 equally noisy vocations near by, while two spruce-grouse, which 

 flew into a juniper back of us, were busy feeding on the berries. 

 Wood-mice and shrews scurried around under the leaves at our 

 feet, and several wrens and a chickadee were accompanied by 

 the nervous chattering of a red squirrel, which, from time to 

 time, viewed us from the branches of every tree within a radius 

 of thirty yards. At one time a solitary loon, winging its w^ay 

 southward above us in the clear autumn air, sent down to us 

 its mournful, quavering cry, and again a flock of red-headed 

 mergansers whistled over our blind and immediately disap- 

 peared around the next bend of the stream. 



When John sent the first long, wailing complaint from the 

 horn drifting over the hills an intense silence seemed to settle 

 over the vicinity of the pond. At the third call a distant bull 

 moose answered from the midst of the alder swamp, where a 

 small creek which flowed into the pond opposite our position 

 originated. After repeated calls the answers became louder, 

 and in three-quarters of an hour, in addition to a continuous 

 grunting, we could hear the splashing of water and the rattling 

 of wide blades against alders as the bull followed down the 

 creek to the source of the call. To this w^as occasionally added 

 the complaining whine of a cow moose, which was endeavoring 

 to dissuade the bull from investigating John's alluring call. 



When hidden by the high alders at the mouth of the creek, 

 both moose stopped, and the bull made a terrific noise, savagely 

 pawing up mud, gravel and water, and thrashing the alders 

 with its antlers. Although only one hundred yards distant, 

 we could see only occasionally enough of the tips of the bull's 



14 



