6 Wilderness Ways. 



himself nowhere. You scour the country for a week, 

 crossing innumerable trails, thinking the surrounding 

 woods must be full of caribou ; then a man in a lum- 

 ber camp, where you are overtaken by night, tells 

 you that he saw the herd you are after 'way down on 

 the Renous barrens, thirty miles below. You go 

 there, and have the same experience, — signs every- 

 where, old signs, new signs, but never a caribou. 

 And, ten to one, while you are there, the caribou are 

 sniffing your snowshoe track suspiciously back on 

 the barrens that you have just left. 



Even in feeding, when you are hot on their trail 

 and steal forward expecting to see them every moment, 

 it is the same exasperating story. They dig a hole 

 through four feet of packed snow to nibble the rein- 

 deer lichen that grows everywhere on the barrens. 

 Before it is half eaten they wander off tc '■he next 

 barren arid dig a larger hole ; then aw;_y to the 

 woods for the gray-green hanging moss that grows 

 on the spruces. Here is a fallen tree half covered 

 with the rich food. Megaleep nibbles a bite or two, 

 then wanders away and away in search of another 

 tree like the one he has just left. 



And when you find him at last, the chances are 

 still against you. You are stealing forward cau- 

 tiously when a fresh sign attracts attention. You 



