XXI 



NO LUCK 



1895 



MOOSE. 



IN the hope of beating my moose head of last year, we, I with 

 two half-breed hunters, had made a temporary home in what 

 had once been the blacksmith's shop the least dilapidated log 

 shanty of an old lumber camp in the Canadian forest. The 

 surrounding bush, long since despoiled of all pines of market- 

 able size, no longer echoed with the sound of the axe ; fresh 

 " limits " were now being worked further and further away, new 

 camps had sprung up where formerly only the hunter or trapper 

 passed, and the old homes of the logger were left to their fate. 

 A few of the old shanties were still used as stables or stores on 

 the line of communication and kept in some sort of repair, but 

 the majority, left to their fate, had soon become unfit as places 

 of abode. The huge pine and cedar logs of which the shanties 

 are constructed of course withstand the ravages of wind and 

 weather for an almost unknown time, but the moss with which 

 the interstices were securely filled soon loosens and falls out, 

 particularly from the roof, when rain and melting snow find 

 ready ingress. 



No doubt ours was the best shanty in that camp ; about 

 20 feet square, it had a door which required repair badly and 

 soon got it ; a paneless window which was at once covered with 

 boards and closed ; a large 5 feet by 5 hearth of earth at 

 one end, with a 4 feet by 4 hole in the roof above it. At 

 first the place did not look particularly inviting, but a broom 

 made from the scrub which grew around more or less cleansed 



204 



