220 
WILD NORWAY, 
ahead. The real elk, I feel assured, was then no further 
than a hundred-and-fifty to two-hundred yards in our 
front, and had there been but a breath of air to enable 
“ Bengel ” to advance direct on scent —instead of having 
to follow out each turn and twist of the spoor—the beast 
was ours. As it was, there came back to us the faint 
crack of a breaking branch, a rustle as of displaced pine- 
boughs, and not another sound broke the stilly solitude. 
The spoor showed where alarm had been conveyed. 
The deer had gone off on a bee-line. Fortunately this 
led towards our hut: so we followed till dusk, the elk 
then going along just under the higher fjeld and among 
the upmost scattered trees, where already he was snatch¬ 
ing a passing bough. There we left him for the night. 
Early in the morning I was on the trail again, and for 
several hours in touch of the bull. To-day at length 
we had the long-wished breeze, with driving rain. 
Firmly did I now believe in an ascendant star, when new- 
fallen “ sign ” lay warm and smoking, and anticipation 
verged on certainty. The bull, in crossing a high bare 
ridge (two thousand two hundred feet), had joined a cow 
and calf. “Will you shoot all three ? ” asked Ole, such was 
his confidence. Twice the triple spoor crossed high fjeld, 
descending to dense pine-forest beyond ; but though the 
wind favoured all day, and the trio were never once 
slcrcempt (alarmed), yet never a glimpse rewarded us 
—never did they stop or change that unvarying course, 
travelling slow but straight, as though bound for a 
specific spot. Twice, if not thrice, we were close up 
(once we actually heard them) and must have been 
almost within shot, could only one clear glimpse have 
been obtained amidst those thickly-crowded trunks. 
