The Moose-Hunter 
By Mikkjel Fonhus 
In the wilds of Norway, where the wolf howls hungrily in the 
winter nights, lies Bjodal, an uninhabited valley about twenty miles 
in length. It is rarely that any one enters it, only now and again a 
solitary hunter. At long intervals distant rifle-shots disturb the peace, 
and then even the silence seems to start and lie listening. 
In the northernmost part of Bjodal stands a little hut with a 
turf roof. Summer comes and winter goes, and there is no sign of 
a fire being lighted in it. One autumn morning, however—the twenty- 
eighth of September—smoke begins to rise from the rusty stove-pipe 
on the roof. The smoke is thick and black, as when resinous wood 
is burning. It sends out a strong scent, which penetrates far into 
the forest; and a fox which has been spending the night in revelry 
turns quickly aside. It is not quite light yet. The darkness hangs in 
the air and in the trees, but the daylight has begun to drift in across 
the eastern heights, and the morning mist lies over marshland and 
lake. 
A man emerges, stooping, from the door of the hut, with a coffee- 
kettle in his right hand: he goes down the south side of the hut, 
where he bends down and fills the kettle from a pool of water. 
The man’s name is Peter Varpet. He is a small, but sturdily 
built man, limps a little with his right foot, but is quick and active. 
He is bare-headed, and his hair is thin and a little gray. Beneath 
his brows are a pair of small eyes, which nothing escapes. For Peter 
is the best moose-hunter to be found in the Bjodal district in the 
autumn; and in spite of his being a little lame and having left the first 
forty years of his life behind him, no one can keep up with him in a 
long run. 
As he opens the door of the hut to go in again, a large, gray 
moose-dog slips out. It makes a stand at the corner of the hut, looks 
thoughtfully towards the forest, and shakes itself. It is Storm, 
Peter s dog, and the two resemble each other. If they put up a moose 
together, they follow it until they see the blood streaming from the 
animal’s throat. 
I his autumn, however, moose-hunting in Bjodal has been poor. 
Peter cannot understand what lias become of the moose; they seem 
to have vanished from the face of the earth as if they had wings 
and had flown away. He has tramped about now for three weeks, 
and the heels of his shoes are worn down and the soles thin; but never 
a moose has he skinned. 
It was here, the evening before, up under the mountain, that a 
moose came running close past him, quite unexpectedly. He had not 
