44 
FOREST • AND STREAM. 
Uan. 17, tgdj. 
they found. Dogs fought singly, in couples, in quar- 
tettes. Then the whole mass seemed to roll itself into 
one huge ball, from which projected innumerable tails 
and multitudinous legs. Huskie, Yukon and yellow 
mongrel were tangled in an inextricable knot. 
Inevitably the excitement communicated itself to the 
men. Into the struggling, yelping throng they pushed 
w^ith whip and club. But for a time blows seemed to have 
no effect, other than to intensify the strife.. For every 
dog struck, thinking himself bitten by an anjAgonist, only 
fought the harder. But the lashing and pie shot-like 
imprecation began in time to tell. Little ny little the 
fighting pack separated until the last half-dozen dogs 
released their holds and with a wild scurry dashed 
across the camp. 
Alas, with that dash our game dinner disappeared. For 
every dog in his wild leap from the snow wall struck the 
center of our improvised table as unerringly as if shot 
from a rifle. 
It was all over in a twinkling. The tremendous im- 
pact of the flying pack left nothing of the feast. Pots and 
pans rolled away overturned, like toy balloons in a gale. 
Moose nose and brisket mingled with tongue and pemmi- 
can--in the half melted snow and mud about the camp- 
fire.^ A half-burned log whose projecting end had been 
struck by the leaping dogs, turned somersault and lay 
across the tablecloth, its further end resting in the pan 
of Scotch bannocks. And Mistatim, true to his thievish 
instinct, was bringing up the rear of the flying colunm 
with his mouth full of sweet cakes! 
The night came softly down. The gray owl sounded 
his lonely cry, the pine tops stirred in the wind and the 
aurora streamed down like a great tent -dyed in all the 
colors of the rainbow. The dogs, full-fed with dried 
moose meat, curled into balls about the tree trunks. The 
men on their beds of pine brush pulled the blankets closer 
and tried to sleep. But never from the waking brain 
went the consciousness of something lost, the longing for 
a game dinner they did not eat. Martyn. 
of life for the uncomfortable. It was, I think, a reac- 
tion from and a rebuke to the refinements of our 
modern Avay of crowding the most people into the least 
space and teaching them to get along like babies reared 
in a barrel and fed through the bung hole by artificial 
means, substituting oxygen for ozone and electricity 
for sunlight, that made him choose the cold and black- 
ness of the northern night. Crowded cities have some 
advantages, but for those in whom the old adventur- 
ous spirit still lives, the wilderness never had greater 
charms than it has to-day. J. B. Burnham. 
The Call of the Wilderness. 
Cold Foot, on the Koyukuk, is a far cry from New 
York city, but I have just had news of a man who 
stepped from one antithesis into the other. From the 
lofty mountain at the head waters of the Koyukuk, the 
polar ocean is visible, and if there is a colder or more 
inaccessible region anywhere, it can only be in the con- 
stantly lessening portion of the Arctic waste that has 
neveSr yet been trodden by the foot of civilized man. 
Shortly after my return from Alaska in 1898, a stran- 
ger introduced by a mutual friend, called on me in a 
New York fiat, and asked about the new mining coun- 
try. He was the manufacturer of an artistic specialty, 
well along toward middle life, with a wife and family, 
and a successful business. He was unfamiliar with the 
rudiments of camp life and had never been in a cold 
country. 
His questions ranged from moccasins, muckluks and 
metasse through all the details of outfit and supplies, 
to maps and routes and the latest mining strikes, and 
though he made no explanation, and in view of his age 
and the settled certainty of his life, the idea seemed 
preposterous. I was forced to believe that he contem- 
plated a prospecting trip into one of the hardest and 
most dangerous countries men have ever penetrated 
in search of gold. 
I will call his name Brown, as possibly he might ob- 
ject to having the history of his tenderfoot days re- 
called. , , 
I told Brown that the Klondike was a sucked orange, 
and that as far as the average man was concerned, the 
gold might as well be in the sub-treasury in Wall 
street, and I did what I could to dissuade liim. He 
persisted, however, in getting at all I knew of the min- 
ing country, and among other things I told him of the 
coarse gold strike on the Koyukuk. 
After that the conversation centered on the Koyu- 
kuk, though I knew next to nothing of the country, 
and that only by hearsay. Two facts seemed to satisfy 
him— gold had been found there and the country was 
difficult of access, and, therefore, not overrun by pros- 
pectors, r ■ , ^ 1- T 
A year later I met the mutual friend to whom i was 
indebted for Brown's visit. In the course of the con- 
versation, he remarked, "By the way, Mrs. Brown has 
had recent news from Mr. Brown. I suppose you know 
that he went to Alaska?" 
I told her that I had not known, but that such being 
the fact, I felt sure I could name the part of Alaska 
to which he had gone, and upon mentioning the Koyu- 
kuk, she said I was right. When Brown went away 
he had cautioned his wife to tell no one of his desti- 
nation, and she had kept the secret till it became im- 
possible— for nearly a year. ,1, j 
He had turned his business over to a brother, ana 
had for the time being cut away all connection with his 
old life. ■ 1 :„ 
A year later I heard that Brown was home again 
on a visit, but I could get no definite information as 
to his success. He went back to the Koyukuk, and for 
two y^krs more I heard nothing of him. Finally last 
fall, I' learned that after four years within the Arctic 
circle. Brown was coming home again, this time as 
owner of one of the best of the placer clamis in the 
whole mining country. , r , » c 
Mr' Brown is no longer a tenderfoot. A beattle 
paper, before me, quotes him as a "pioneer of the 
Koyukuk," who "joined m the 1B98 stampede and 
located on Myrtle Creek, the oldest as well as one of 
the richest creeks in the camp." The paper treats his 
conclusions as to the richness of the district with defer- 
ence, and quotes him at length as to the probable 
output of gold. Dry, Vermont and other producers 
not failing to mention the "distressing scarcity ot 
water during the past summer" as a factor in lessen- 
ing the output. r 1 TT •„ „ 
I am glad that Brown has been successful. He s a 
Scotchman and his racial persistence has got him 
what he' went after. The thing that interests me most 
in him, however, is the motive which impelled hnn to 
give up Sit the eleventh hour the comfortable things 
One Kind of a Moose Hunt. 
Early last summer something told me that I ought 
to have a nice moose head to add to my collection of 
hunting trophies, and with the hope of being able to 
secure this, I left New York by way of the New York 
Central Railroad at 7:30 P. M. on Sept. 29 last. 
The following morning at 9 o'clock I arrived at 
Montreal, and after looking to the transfer of my bag- 
gage, and seeing to its passage through the hands of 
the custom house officers — which caused me not the 
least bit of trouble — I then spent a couple of hours 
looking around the city, leaving there at 12 o'clock over 
the Inter-Colonial Railroad for New Castle, Northum- 
berland county, New Brunswick. Along toward even- 
ing we passed by on the opposite side of the river from 
that old and interesting city, Quebec. From our train 
we had a very good view of Duflferin Terrace and Mont- 
morency Falls. I had spent some little time there just 
sixteen years previous, and this old city, surrounded 
with its walls, sitting on a high bluff, looked just as it 
did on my former visit. 
From Quebec the ride to New Castle was not par- 
ticularly interesting, as the road lay mostly through 
timber land. After an early breakfast on the train the 
next morning, our train pulled in to New Castle at 
7:25, and I was met there by the man sent by Mr. John 
Robinson, Jr., game overseer of Northumberland 
county, with whom I had previously corresponded, 
and who had made all the arrangements for my 
hunt. He drove me down into the town proper, 
which lay alongside the Miramichi River, and there I 
found Mr. Robinson waiting for me. (I want to take 
this opportunity to commend both Mr. Robinson, as 
well as my guide. The former for the very careful man- 
ner in which he attended to my arrangements, as to 
securing guide, license, provisions, etc.; and to the lat- 
ter for his untiring efforts toward making my hunt a 
successful one.) 
Soon after the arrival of my guide, Mr. Carl Bersing 
put in an appearance, and as all our camp baggage ana 
provisions had already been arranged for and sent out 
ahead by Mr. Robinson, we loaded my personal camp 
baggage on a two-horse spring-wagon and departed on 
our forty-mile drive to the first camp. A couple of hours 
out we picked up our cook, and at noon stopped ai 
Ways, twenty miles out, the last house among the set- 
tlements, for lunch, and immediately after leaving there 
we entered the timber land. Worse roads than we en- 
countered during the remainder of the forty-mile drive 
I have seldom found. 
Just before dark we stopped at a little run called 
Stonybrook, where we "boiled" (the Provincial term to 
indicate building a fire, making tea and getting a lunch). 
Leaving there, we journeyed on to our main camp 
called Sevogle Cabin, where we arrived at 10:50 P. M., 
or a little more than forty-eight hours after leaving 
New York. 
We found the camp, a log cabin, with wood floor and 
birch bark roof, to be both warm and dry, with a stove 
in one end and bunks in the other end. The cabin had 
just, two days before, been vacated by Mr. Georgtr 
Dominick, Jr., of New York city, who had spent a 
couple of delightful weeks there, during which time he 
had secured a nice moose; but while absent from camp 
one day a bear came in and ran away with the scalp 
of the moose. They never again saw either the scalp 
or the bear. On my arrival at New Castle, I had re- 
ceived a short note from him telling me of this, and 
saying, "If you see this old bear give him one for me, 
too." When I read this note I had little expectation of 
seeing this or any other bear; but subsequent events 
turned out differently, and this only goes to show what 
a degree of uncertainty attends hunting. 
Early the next morning, we packed up some pro- 
visions, our sleeping bags and a small canvas lean-to 
and took the trail to Peabody's Lake, a distance of 
about four miles, there to go into camp and try our 
first luck at moose hunting. We walked (as I might 
say, we always did, there being no horses or trails for 
horses in that section) all the way through close timber. 
When about half way out a young bull moose came out 
on the trail a short distance ahead of us, but on hearing 
us quickly ran out of sight. He had but small horns, 
and we made no attempt to secure him. It was a very 
interesting sight to me, however, as it was the first 
moose I had ever seen outside of captivity, and I was 
greatly surprised at the appearance it presented. 
In color the body was a dark brown and black, while 
the legs shaded off a little lighter. The ears seemed 
very long, and he traveled and looked to me not unlike 
a mule; in fact, he looked so different from what I had 
expected that it took me a few minutes to realize that 
it was not a domestic animal. 
On our arrival near the lake we stopped to make 
camp, but first walked to the lake to take a look for 
moose. I found it quite a pretty body of water, A'ery 
shallow along the edges, about three-quarters of a mile 
long and one-half mile in width, and surrounded on all 
sides with heavy undergrowth and timber, right down 
to its edges. We saw nothing, so we returned to the 
camping place, and the boys proceeded to make camp, 
put up the tents, and get lunch. 
They built what they called an "A lean-to," by putting 
up two posts about five feet apart, with a small pole 
across the top, and stretching canvas from this pole at 
an angle of 45 degrees back to the ground, about eight 
feet, thus leaving an opening in front, directly in front 
of which a camp-fire was then built; and in this open 
tent, or lean-to, we slept comfortably. 
Toward evening we went back to the lake, hauled out 
the boat, which we found hidden in the laushes, and 
rowed across, where we stationed ourselves behind an 
old treetop, and Carl then proceeded to give the moose 
call with his birch bark horn. This horn was made of 
birch bark rolled up and fastened with a string, making 
an opening about three-fourths of an inch in diameter at 
tlie moutn and four inches in diameter at the big end 
and about twelve inches long. After calling for some 
time, and getting no answer, we rowed out into the lake 
and caught a fine string of trout for our supper, after 
which we again returned to the shore and called until 
evening, but without success, returning to camp just 
as darkness was setting in. 
Carl soon had a fire going, and in the absence of a 
frying-pan, he cut a "skiver," stripped some trout on it 
with a piece of bacon between each, and sticking one 
end of the "skiver" in the ground and the other end 
in front of the hot coals, he soon had the trout broiling 
nicely. 
The following morning we were up at daybreak, and 
again at the lake, calling. After about an hour's time 
a big cow moose came out to the lake on the opposite 
side and stood in a listening attitude for some little 
time. Then she started to walk along the edge of the 
lake in water about eight inches deep, and continued 
on around until a little more than one hundred yards 
from where we were stationed, and there she turned and 
walked off into the timber. We heard her walking and 
thrashing around in the timber near us for more than 
an hour. We saw nothing more, and late that evening 
we returned to our main camp at Sevogle Cabin. 
The next morning we packed up and started for 
Clearwater Camp, twelve miles distant, Carl, Will the 
cook, and Fred the packer, all carrying packs on their 
backs. After a tramp of five hours, at all times 
through dense timber and underbrush, and over mostly 
a flat and at times very swampy country, we arrived at 
our destination, and after eating a lunch, Carl and I 
went to the lake, and we again tried calling, but with- 
out success. 
Our camp at Clearwater I found to be a cabin con- 
structed somewhat similar to that of Sevogle, but not 
quite so large. 
The next morning Carl suggested that we take a 
walk up along the brook a few miles and see what 
signs we could find up that way. After walking a mile 
through dense underbrush and timber, we sat down on 
a log and listened for something, but heard nothing, 
and again continued on about another mile. We were 
moving quietly along the trail, when we heard a slight 
noise to our right, close by the trail; and on looking 
first saw a slight movement of a bush and then what 
appeared first to me to be a big log or stump, but 
which on second examination I found to be a big black 
bear. He lay partly crouching by a log, and just 21 feet 
from where I stood. I fired two shots quickly, both 
striking him in the back of the neck— the first one for 
myself and the second for Mr. Dominick — and he 
dropped. After making sure that he was dead, we went 
to him and found a very nice specimen, measuring 4 
feet 10 inches across his forearms and breast, and 6 
feet 9 inches long from the tip of his nose to the end 
of his hindfeet when lying on his back, without being 
stretched. His hindfeet measured 7 inches long, and 
we supposed him to weight about 400 pounds. 
I am free to confess that my first sight of him gave 
me somewhat of a start, and for a moment we thought 
we would surely be in for a scrap. After Carl removed 
the hide and head, we then returned to the camp, where 
we arrived about 4 o'clock, first having cached the skin 
and head just outside of the cabin. 
Immediately upon entering the cabin, we lamented 
about there being no game in the country, etc., and 
about our luck in not securing anything, and I told Will 
the cook that I had fired a bullet into a tree to see how 
it would mushroom, and showed him the bullet I had 
gotten out of the bear's skull. After commenting a 
little on it I told Carl he had better bring a piece of 
the tree in and show it to Will; and a few moments 
afterward Carl stepped into the doorway with the bear 
skin and head, with its mouth open, and said to Will, 
"There is the tree." He was lying down on one of 
the bunks at the time, with his back to the door, and 
turning his head, looked over his shoulder to see the 
section of the tree. On seeing the bear's head and 
open mouth he gave one jump and landed in the mid- 
dle of the floor, regardless of his lame leg, and ex- 
claimed, "For the Lord's sake! if I had known these 
animals were roaming around these woods I never 
would have stayed in camp alone without a gun." 
It furnished a topic for conversation for the re- 
mainder of the day, and a couple of hours afterward I 
heard him say to Carl out in the woodyard, "I might 
have known you fellows were lying, for I knew you had 
no ax with which to chop a tree down." 
During that night it commenced to rain, and was 
still raining the next morning when we got up, and in 
fact continued to rain the whole day long. Notwith- 
standing that, however, we left camp about i o'clock 
and still-hunted until dark, returning to our camp wet 
through. 
The next day we spent a couple of hours in both the 
morning and evening at the lake, calling, and still- 
hunted the balance of the day, but without success. The 
following day we decided we would take the trail for 
Bald Mountain, fifteen miles distant. 
We traveled all the way through an unbroken forest, 
following a blazed trail most of the way. 
Along about 4 o'clock in the afternoon, when just 
about a mile from South Fork Brook, where we in- 
tended going into camp for the night, we saw a bull 
moose close by the trail, and although he stood for a 
few moments in plain sight of Carl, yet he was in such 
a position that I was unable to see him until he started 
lo run away. He ran some distance parallel with the 
trail and then came out on it, but I did not fire at him. 
I afterward thought, and still think that I should have 
done so, but my reason for hesitating was that I 
thought I might only wound him, and felt that unless 1 
could stop him I v.'Ould prefer losing the chance rather 
than that he should go off wounded. 
When we went into camp I felt as though I would 
