330 THE OLD-WORLD ELK 



thicket in which a violinist and a hunter were 

 concealed, and seriously injured one of the men.'^ 

 We all feel that way sometimes, when we hear 

 someone scraping the strings of a violin without 

 knowing how to play. 



In Siberia and a large share of European Russia 

 the people in general have been in the habit of 

 exercising, with more or less legal sanction, the 

 free right of hunting. In the exercise of this right 

 season, age, sex, method — everything but slaughter 

 has been lost to sight. As a result there has been a 

 great reduction in the number of elk to be found 

 on both sides of the inter-continental boundary — a 

 reduction which, unchecked, and aided by improved 

 firearms, would lead to extermination.^^ 



Pitfalls are much used by the peasants of Russia. 

 Sometimes a series of pitfalls, with intervening 

 barriers to lead the animals to their doom, are 

 constructed by men who seek to make a living 

 by the slaughter of game. Once a week, or per- 

 haps only once a fortnight, the pitfalls are visited, 

 and sometimes elk are found in them which have 

 starved to death. Similar barriers are erected in 

 Siberia, sometimes three or four miles long, with 

 a number of openings at which snares and spring- 

 es Field Sports of the North of Europe (London, 1885), p. 293. 

 e^Martenson, p. 130. 



