266 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
forest with a heavy cloak of white Tendered it impossible 
for us to come face to face with atiy of these ghost-like 
wanderers of the woods. Jack the Silent proved himself 
able to get one when needed for meat, however, since 
when sent out after a caribou he came hack before even- 
ing with the quiet remark that he had killed one about 
three or four miles out from camp. 
Moving Camp. 
Sunday, Dec. 8. we made a day of rest. It is contrary 
to the law to himt on Simday in New Brunswick, even 
had we cared to do so. We fixed tip our frozen feet, 
mended a sled or two, got in some meat from Jack's cari- 
-bou, and in general made ready for an early start over to 
the Bathurst camp. Adam was thoroughlA^ angered at this 
conduct of the moose, which he declared were behavmg 
in a most unprincipled manner. He figured out that the 
bulls must be further back in the hill counti-y, which was 
hard to reach if we had to return to camp on the .same 
day. "We'll try it over at Bathurst camp," said he, "and 
see what we can do over in there." 
The Bathurst camp is the second in importance of the 
Moore camps, of which there are six or eight in all. It 
is situated just across the height of land which separates 
the Tobique waters from the Nipisiguit waters, the latter 
flowing toward the eastward, whereas the Tobique waters 
flow westward. 
On Monday Adam and I made a short caribou hunt in 
snowshoeing, which was simply awful, but did not get 
up with anything, as the big herds seemed to have moved 
up into the hill country further by this time. 
On Tuesday morning, when we started for our move, 
we packed up three toboggans with our belongings, which 
included some supplies which we needed for our stay at 
the other camp, I started out ahead of the party and 
crossed the "carry," or three-mile portage between the 
Nictor and Bathurst chains, an easy trail which involves 
only two or three short and easy climbs. I found again 
that the caribou were on the war path. John had reported 
them all over this trail when he went out after his caribou 
meat, and I found many fresh trails. They had crossed 
the snowshoe trail in seven different places in a space of 
less than a mile. Possibly there were twenty or thirty 
head of them in all, which were enjoying this promenade 
along the snowshoe trail. I learned then that so far 
from being afraid of human sign, the caribou simply 
exults in a snowshoe trail. He is a very good snowshoer 
himself, but not in the least averse to falling into the 
beaten track made. by his bitterest enemy, man. 
When we came out upon the pretty little expanse of the 
Bathurst Lake, we found that the caribou had been here 
also, and their tracks were visible in many places on the 
wide white expanse. 
The snow was again wet and very heavy, so that tobog- 
gan traveling was a serious matter. I tried my hand at 
pulling one of these iqnocent looking sleds, and found it 
required about four times the muscular exertion I had 
supposed it would from seeing the ease with which my 
companions snaked them along. 
Bathurst camp I found to be a double house, rather 
smaller than Nictor camp, but very comfortable. There 
was a stove in each of the houses, but we lived in the 
smaller camp, and did not take the trouble to warm up the 
larger room excepting at meal times, or when we wanted 
better elbow room while mending toboggans or the like. 
The camp itself was admirably located and comfortable 
to a degree. This is a favorite trout fishing locality, and 
I presume that there is no better trout fishing stream in 
New Brunswick than the Nipisiguit River, which heads 
within a gunshot of this Bathurst camp. The Nipisiguit 
trout fishing is leased by George Armstrong, who pays 
$50 a year for it. Moore and Cremin take over half this 
lease, thus arranging for the fishing of all their friends 
and customers who come in with them. 
Bad Weather. 
It could not be said that the weather had thus far been 
very propitious, for we had had hardly one decent day's 
hunting when the going was in the least practicable. Sleet 
fell all day Tuesday, followed by a pouring ram at night. 
The shoeing was very bad, and although we hoped for 
a freeze, we knew that a freeze meant crust, that a crust 
meant noise, and that noise meant no moose. I found 
this country one of great humidity, with much precipita- 
tion and a great deal of fog. The view about us was 
•wild and bleak, the tops of the forbidding ridges lost 
much of the time in fog. T was told that this sort of 
weather is most unusual, and that ordmarily a quiet and 
fairly dry cold may be anticipated. Later we were told 
that this December never had its like in all the history of 
the Province for wretched weather. 
On the morning of the iith we found that the sleet had 
been covered by deep wet snow, and the crust, though 
damp, was still noisy. The snowshoeing was simply 
awful, ice forming under the feet continiially. None the 
]e«s Adam and I went out on a sort of forlorn hope that 
Avr- might get my caribou. We found a fresh trail at the 
edge of the lake, and followed it into the thickets. We 
were never more than an hour behind our game, and this 
time we thought we were going to get our shot, for the 
caribou were evidently feeding and the weather condi- 
tions were not absolutely impossible after all. Indeed, we 
got within fifty or sixty yards of o«r game, but a beastly 
little calf which happened to be nearest to us gave the 
alarm to the rest of the bunch, and all we saw was a 
distant white tail at which no sportsman would have 
risked a shot. 1 1 
After that we went on up into a httle barren where the 
caribou sometimes feed, but drew a blank. Bethinking 
ourselves of our snowshoe trail of the day before, we 
went back over the "carry" trail. The rascally beasts had 
been all over it, subsequent to our crossing there on the 
previous day. We walked over half-way to the Nictor 
Lake. When we came back, we found four more fresh 
tracks directly in the snowshoe trail, and made since we 
had passed. This time again we came very near to get- 
tmg a shot, for we had jumped these caribou through an 
unlucky shift in the wind when we were within less than 
100 yards of them. As it happened, they were just out of 
view and, of course, when they had once reached the 
thick cover it was all over. So we went back home again, 
having been once more with game 'all around us, and no 
chance of getting a shot. 
By this time Adam was getting a bit discouraged with 
the way luck was running against tls. I pointed out to 
him that we would probably have no luck at all, since 
1 had been so unfortunate as to lose my mascot, the quart 
tin cup which I wore through the Yellowstone Park in 
the winter time many years ago, and which I purchased 
of Uncle Sam at Fort Yellowstone. We searched for this 
latter, but could never find it, and I presume that some 
generations hence some scientist will pick it up and figure 
out how long it was that the Yankees invaded Blue Nose 
Land. The cup had a big "U. S." stamped on the handle, 
'and had been fastened to my belt on many a hunt by 
means of a homely and ultimately treacherous piece of 
knotted coffee sack, 
"You stay at the camp for a day or sd now," said Adam 
to me, "and I'll take Jack and we'll go up into the liills 
toward Silver Brook, and see if we can't locate a moos£. 
If we see anything worth while, we'll be that much ahead, 
and if we don't, why then it will be only Jack and me 
who will have the tired feeling." 
This plan was carried out, and it was agreed that Jack 
and Adam should sleep out that night in one of their 
outlying camps, which they called the Klondike camp, 
situated far up in one of the roughest portions of the 
Province, near the east branch of what is known as the 
Silver Brook. They took one blanket and some supplies 
with them in their packs, and got an early start. 
More Caribou. 
Meantime Charlie and I made another effort to secure 
that caribou. Again we found fresh tracks all over our 
yesterday's trail, but nothing showed on the ice for some 
time. At last we saw a cow and calf which were feeding 
rapidly along the edge of the lake about three-quarters of 
a mile aAvay. These we followed, much of the time in 
plain sight, but always taking the precaution to move 
when they moved. We could no doubt have killed this 
cow had we cared to do so, but the cow had no horns, and 
although it is not against the law to kill a cow caribou, 
cow moose only being protected, I did not care to kill 
a female. Therefore, we did not hurry much in our stalk- 
ing of this game, and at last saw the animals disappear 
at the edge of the lake. Then all at once we got blood- 
thirsty. We concluded that cow caribou would be pretty 
good meat, so we took a shot at the disappearing animals, 
at a range of about 475 yards, and we made very close 
practice of it. Charlie went down to step off the distance 
just for curiosity, and meantime I sat down on a log and 
enjoyed the beautiful winter morning, which was ideal in 
every respect. All at once I heard Charlie's gun behind 
me. and looking around saw the identical cow and calf 
which had lately disappeared, and which had now, for 
some fool caribou reason or other, taken the notion to 
come out otl the ice again. The two started straight 
across the middle of the lake, a distance of perhaps a 
mile. They did not gallop, but struck the caribou trot, 
which is the most comical and absurd looking gait any 
man ever did witness. Their great hind legs, sticking 
up at an impossible angle, at the hock joint, came trailing 
along behind them, so that at one time I thought we had 
broken a leg of the calf. For, be it known, we again be- 
came inconsistently bloodthirsty, and we smoked them up 
a few shots just for luck, the range about 900 to 1,000 
yards. The absurd ^ait of the creatures set us to laugh- 
ing, so we did not try to shoot any more, and thg animals 
skirted the far edge of the lake, and presently took to the 
woods beyond. Charlie and I then went back to our 
snowshoe trail on the "carry." Here we found two 
fresh trails, and afterward as we came back we discovered 
the trail of a cow and calf caribou, both apparently trot- 
ting. We thought these were our friends of the morning, 
which had simply made a circle and come back across the 
"carry" trail, heading toward the country where we 
found them at first. Charlie and I went clear across the 
Nictor Lake, but saw nothing on Nictor, and believed that 
■ the caribou of that vicinity had moved back into the 
hills.' 
Friday fell on the 13th, and oddly enough, on that day 
our luck was broken to just a little extent, although not 
in my favor, I went out for a solitary caribou hunt. 
Nothing showed on the lake this morning, although there 
v/ere two fresh trails again on the carry. The crust was 
very noisy, and I went along very slowly and carefully 
on the old trail, hoping that the crust might have driven 
some caribou in to the easier going. Presently as I 
stopped to listen, I heard a faint noise on my left and 
saw a small caribou, without any horns, just disappear- 
ing beyond the edge of the hills. From the noise made 
by a man in walking on this crust, I should have expected 
a caribou to make ten times as much noise as this one 
did. I did not shoot at it, as it was a poor specimen, and 
the mark was a bit uncertain. Yet, just a little further 
along the trail, as I glanced up I saw two caribou, slipping 
along far more silently than I would have believed pos- 
sible, and making directly across my trail. 
"I've got you this time, my boy," thought I, for I 
determined to kill one, even although no horns were 
visible. I held low and fine and got the lead just right 
as I pulled, although at that time I was obliged to fire 
directly through a small evergreen tree which screened 
my vicAV. A black mass apparently went down in front 
of me, and I was entirely satisfied that I had killed him, 
but to my intense surprise I found no caribou when I 
got to the spot, but saw two white tails bobbing off a 
couple of hundred yards away down the snow-covered 
trail! Whether I was more angry or surprised I hardly 
know even yet. I found my bullet mark about eighteen 
inches above the snow line, and a couple of feet to the 
side of the trail, but instead of leaping on across the 
trail, both caribou had ducked and dodged into it, after its 
Ijetter footing. I learned how much they dreaded the 
crust, for these caribou kept to the trail for 500 yards. 
I saw where, moose fashion, they had twice turned to 
look around- to spy out their pursuer. 
There was nothing on Nictor Lake when I went over 
to it, and later when I met Charlie on the back track, he 
had not seen any caribou, although we picked up four 
fresh trails going back. The creatures were like ghosts, 
slipping in and out everywhere except where we ourselves 
chanced to be. 
That night, however, there was a different story to tell. 
Adam and Jack came in staggering under heavy loads. I 
saw horns sticking out from the comer of one of the 
sacks. 
The Hoodoo Broken. 
"We've killed the hoodoo," said Adam, gleefully. "1 
thought that this gang could get a moose when we really 
had to have a moose." (Neither Adam nor Charlie had 
yet killed his moose for this season.) 
It seemed that the moose was a fine young bull, a three- 
year-old, and Adam had killed it that morning at about 
half-past eight, a very little time after he had left camp. 
He trailed it for some distance, and at last saw it in a 
little brook, high up toward the top of the ridge, and 
about 100 yards away. "I knew when I saw it that it 
was my moose," said Adam, "and I concluded to kill it 
just to break the hoodoo. It is not a very big head, but 
it's a whole lot better than no moose at all. I just took a 
good fair sight, and I only had to shoot once with the 
.30-40." The moose was shot through the lungs, the ball 
breaking one of the spinal processes. Adam said that it 
sank down at once and only moved its head two or three 
times, being quite dead when he got to it He found then 
that he^had left his knife back at the Klondike camp, and 
had to walk back to get it. Then he skinned the moose, 
hung up the hide in the camp, and he and Jack later 
came on down with the head and part of the meat. They 
had passed a very wretched night with their one blanket 
at the Klondike camp, for the Aveather had come off quite 
c(pld, and it was necessary for a fire to be kept up all 
night. 
Adam had seen any amount of moose sign on his hunt ' 
of to-day and yesterday, and in the same neighborhood 
where he killed his moose he saw three small bulls, all of 
which had been lying down in the open water. 
Jack had hunted in a different direction from that taken 
by his father, and it was a very satisfactory report indeed 
which he brought back with him. He had located a 
inoose yard and had seen unmistakable sign of one or 
more bulls. He said that when he got into the edge of 
the yard he came back, and did not believe that any of the 
game had scented him, so that there would be a fair 
chance of finding a moose, and a bull moose, too, in that 
neighborhood on the following day. All of which raised 
our spirits very much indeed, for time was slipping away 
very rapidly now, and since we had started out to kill, 
my moose, we rather wanted to do it. | 
Moose Shank Moccasins. 
Adam and Jack -brought in a splendid fox skin, it ap- 
pearing that this fox had gotten into an old bear trap 
which had been left set at the Klondike catnp the fall pre- 
vious. The fur was beautiful. We were now getting 
quite a bunch of fur in camp, to say nothing of our cari- 
bou trophies and these recent spoils of the little bull 
moose. Adam brought down the shanks of the moose, 
and although he thought they would be a little small for 
his own feet, advised me to make a pair of shank moc- 
casins out of them. Charlie, ever ready, sewed up the 
small ends of the shanks with stout thread, made a mix- 
ture of saltpetre, alum and water, filled up the shanks 
with the liquid and hung them up to tan for twenty-four 
hours. As a result, I got a very practical pair of rough- 
and-ready moccasins, such as are very higlily prized by 
the genuine woodsmen of the snowshoe country. A 
moose shank well tanned can hardly be worn out The 
snow does not stick to it at all, and it is very warm and 
absolutely water proof. It seems devised by nature for 
the_ natural foot covering oi man, even for the bump 
v/hich comes right where a man's ankle bone strikes the 
side of the shoe. This 'bump on the hock joint is biggest 
in the deer, next in size on the caribou and smallest on the 
moose. Charlie pointed out also that the deer had the 
longest tail, the caribou the next longest and the moose 
the shortest. 
"It's funny how these things run, sort of in grades, in 
all kinds of animals," said he. "Now, here you have the 
v/easel, and next to that comes the sable, and then the 
fisher, and then the wolverine, and next the bear. If you 
learn the habits of all these you will find that each one 
has habits something like the one just above him and just 
below him in the scale. Ain't that funny?" 
More Cariboo. 
As to caribou, Jack saw four caribou within ten yards 
of him this morning, and he says he could have caught 
one had they not taken their back track. The crust was 
now bothering the caribou very much, and we could hav.e 
made a very successful crust hunt on that day if we 
had cared to do so. The caribou had made a regular 
road on the ridge up to the Klondike^ country from which 
Adam and Jack had just come. There were literally scores 
cf them all about, and how we kept from blundering upon 
them was hard to understand. I certainly was never in 
any country in all my life where there was so great a 
number of game animals so close about. Had this been 
in the Rocky Mountain country, our hunt would have 
been oyer before the end of the second day, for in the 
open ridges which mark most parts of the Rocky Moun- 
tain hunting region- there are always chances to see game 
once in a while. The thick forests of New Brunswick are 
a great protective agency. We talked moose that night 
and Adam pointed out dozens of places close about, each 
of which had some moose story connected with it. 
A Diving Moose. 
"I suppose you do not believe that a moose will actu- 
ally dive?" said he to me. "That proposition is some- 
times disputed by the authorities, but the authorities don't' 
always know. Now, I saw a inoose dive on Upsilquitch 
Lake last year, and it not onlj' went altogether under the 
water, but it stayed under the vvater for fully a minute at 
a time. It would stay down underneath the surface unlrii 
the water was very still, so that you would not know 
that anything was under it at all. I saw sometliing shiri-| 
ing white in the sun above the surface of the water, and 
at last we saw it was a moose feeding, and then we saw 
close at hand this moose, which was diving for its feed. 
A moose is a great creature to get into the water. They 
v/ade all over little Nictor Lake, which is fully four feet' 
deep in places. Of course it is not unusual for a moose 
to stick its head under water, but this is the first time I 
ever saw one go completely under and entirely out of 
sight." 
We felt pretty good this night, Friday, the 13th, m 
spite of the bad weather we had been having, and which 
