DRAWN BY AUGUST WILL. 



MAP SHOWING THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE MOOSB- IN THE DOTTED TERRITORY THE MOOSE STILL EXISTS. 

 IN THE LINED TERRITORY THE MOOSE IS EXTINCT. 



can elk, or wapiti {Cervus canadeitsis). The 

 moose closely resembles the European elk, 

 an animal well nigh extinct, but which in Cae- 

 sar's time abounded in the lands about the 

 Baltic, and thus the name " elk " has been some- 

 times applied to the moose. Long usage, hmv- 

 ever, in this country has confined the term " elk" 

 to the wapiti deer of the West, and it can create 

 only obscurity to use it in any other sense. So, 

 also, by reason of a resemblance to the Scottish 

 stag (Cervus claphus).ox red deer of Europe, the 

 wapiti has been termed " red deer " by Eng- 

 lishmen. The word moose is the Indian word 

 " moosoa," meaning "wood-eater," in allusion 

 to the fact that the animal lives on twigs and 

 the bark of young trees rather than by graz- 

 ing, for which its short neck is not adapted. 



The moose is distinctively a forest-loving 

 animal, and lives only in wooded countries 

 where the winters are long and severe. There 

 seem to be in its geographical distribution two 

 distinct ranges, one in the northeast and the 

 other in the northwest of our continent. These 

 two territories are at the present day separated 

 by the strip of land between Lake Superior 

 and James Bay, where no moose are found. 

 They have always been less numerous in the 

 West than in the extreme East, where the for- 

 ests and lakes are singularly well fitted to their 

 habits, and it is here that they are still hunted 

 with the most success. In northern Montana, 

 Wyoming, Idaho, Washington, and, perhaps, 

 Dakota, northward to the Mackenzie River, 

 moose are moderately abundant in the moun- 

 tain districts, but very inaccessible to the hun- 

 ter. Their southernmost limit in this section 

 is the junction of the Snake River with the 

 Three Tetons in Idaho. There are a few in 

 the Yellowstone Park, but here the best moose 



346 



country is imperiled by the Segregation Bill 

 now before the Senate, which threatens to open 

 up half of the Timber Land Preserve, including 

 nearly all the moose district, and which should 

 be vigorously opposed by every true sportsman. 

 They extend through the mountains of Brit- 

 ish Columbia into Alaska, where the coast In- 

 dians tell of gigantic moose which come down 

 from the unexplored interior in severe winters. 

 Their extreme eastern limit north of the Ca- 

 nadian border is the Lake of the Woods and 

 Dog Lake in Manitoba, around which they are 

 numerous. South of the line they extend far- 

 ther east, and are rather plentiful (that is, for 

 moose, which is everywhere a scarce animal) 

 in the tamarack swamps of northern Minnesota 

 around Red Lake. A very few are found in 

 Wisconsin and the north peninsula of Michi- 

 gan. In 1875 a number were killed near 

 Superior City in the extreme northwest of 

 Wisconsin, but they probably wandered down 

 from the lake country just mentioned. Beyond 

 the St. Lawrence they are found from points 

 north of Lake Huron as far east as the Saguenay, 

 which seems an almost absolute boundary. 

 There are none in Labrador. At the present 

 day they extend northward to the " height of 

 land " or watershed of Hudson Bay, but for- 

 merly they pushed northward to the great bay 

 itself In the country immediately north of Lake 

 Superior none are found, although at one time 

 they extended as far north and west as the Al- 

 bany River. 



South of St. Lawrence they were once very 

 numerous in all the country, roughly speaking, 

 between this river, the sea, and the 43d paral- 

 lel in New York. There is no trace known of 

 them in Pennsylvania, or immediately south of 

 the great lakes, in historic times, but remains 



