216 
WILD NORWAY. 
again Ole left the direct spoor, taking wide casts to 
right and left, to save the wind—or rather, to avoid 
the risk of getting to windward; but always recovering 
the lost thread and working it cautiously forward. 
At midday we stopped for lunch, to windward of a 
wide fell-meadow, where we thought ourselves quite 
secure, having cast wide on either flank. But at that 
same moment our bull, having skirted back through 
the timber, was himself making a noontide couch almost 
directly to leeward ! The fact we, of course, discovered 
an hour later, on resuming the trail and following it 
round to the point where the bull had lain down 
beneath a pine, a mile behind us. Thence, the great 
splashing spoor—prints six yards apart, ploughing up 
the peat—plainly told that he had gone off in alarm 
and at full gallop. This burst lasted full five miles 
straight, before a sign of slackening was observable, 
and even then the elk kept travelling. We stuck to 
him, however, and towards five o’clock were aware by 
“ Bengel’s ” increasing excitement—the dog now strain¬ 
ing hard on the leash—that we were again overhauling 
the deer. The ground here, overlooking the head¬ 
waters of Furudal-vand, consisted of sloping rock-ridges 
with heather and fairly open timber—highly favourable 
for approach—and anticipation soared high. Once more 
luck played us false. For hours we had not seen a 
grouse; but now, at the critical moment, when within 
some two hundred yards of our game, up clatter a brace 
of ryper, cackling and becking for all they are worth. 
The deer was gone in the same instant. 
Considering the favouring ground, and the fact that 
the beast was travelling fairly straight—these two 
