38 BIG GAME OP NOKTH AMERICA. 



I was too tired to return to camp that night, and fortune 

 favored me to the extent that I was given shelter by a kind- 

 hearted Indian. I was fed on smoked fish and smoked 

 venison, and slept in a bed of smoked skins; but fatigue 

 and hunger give flavor to food, and make even an Indian's 

 bunk a soft and sweet bed. 



On Christmas-day, 1883, and during the following week, 

 I had some thrilling experiences with Moose in the deep 

 snow on the mountains at the head of Warm River, one of 

 the tributaries of the Snake, in Idaho. 



I had established a winter camp in that isolated but 

 picturesque mountain region. The snow was four feet deep 

 on Christmas-day, and soft and level as the grass in a 

 meadow. Our meat-supply was reduced to a limited quan- 

 tity of strong bacon, and that was incentive sufficient to 

 hasten my movements to secure some fresh and choice 

 roasts suited to the tastes of a hunter. Only aman accus- 

 tomed to the snow-shoe would undertake an excursion over 

 mountains and canons with four feet of soft snow on the 

 ground; but, with the experience Of the mountaineer, no 

 better conditions could be desired when Elk or Moose are 

 the game to be hunted. 



I was out early, even in that hour when trees and rocks 

 snap the most with frost and the full moon is palest and 

 looks the coldest, just before the "sun-dogs" appear in the 

 east. A rifle swung lightly over my shoulder, held in 

 place by a leather strap. My Norwegian snow-shoes cut 

 the crisp, velvety, glistening carpet with the slightest 

 " whish-whish " imaginable, and my speed was at least six 

 miles an hour as I skirted the bald mountain at a slight 

 descent. 



On, on I went for five miles, and then turned to climb 

 to the great White Pine Park, more than a thousand feet 

 above. By the use of my pole, I made the winding ascent 

 as fast as a man would walk on a good road on an up-grade 

 so steep. The mountain-side was barren of timber, with 

 many walls of basaltic rocks standing up in impassable bar- 

 riers, frowning and dark above the snow. Around these 



