ELK-HUNTING IN NAMDALEN. 
237 
sometimes kept ahead of us for two or three days 
on end. 
The elk is essentially a browsing animal, and the 
long pendulous upper lip is provided by nature for 
seizing and pulling down branches. Yet in autumn, 
when the forest-vegetation is at its height, the elk 
certainly grazes to some extent. In many places, whole 
beds of fern were seen stripped of their fronds, leaving- 
only the naked stalk, and where tall sedge-grasses grew 
waist-deep, the prehensile lip had here and there snatched 
an armful of flowering tops. I remember my old friend, 
Mr. Clive Phillipps-Wolley—as hard a hunter, by the 
way, and as keen, as ever walked the woods—being- 
bitterly criticised for a similar statement in regard to the 
moose, though in the case of elk it is certainly correct.* 
The normal habits of the elk are as follows :—He is 
astir with the first signs of dawn and moves about, 
feeding, till near noon : covering an immense extent of 
ground, but, owing to his circling, devious course, 
seldom getting very far away from the original spot. 
Towards midday he lies down for a siesta of uncertain 
duration—from two to five hours—usually under the 
shelter of trees; but when the weather is hot, and 
mosquitoes torment, in the midst of open boggy moor¬ 
land, or a moist fj eld-meadow, where his ponderous body 
speedily converts the bed into a tepid bath. In every 
case when we came upon them thus, the wily beast had 
circled well round to leeward before couching, thus 
ensuring to himself timely notice by the wind of any 
* Had I then known as much as I now know of the habits of 
elk and some other big-game, I would not have allowed an absent 
man to be attacked with impunity by anonymous critics. 
