720 
FOREST AND STREAM 
June 8, 1912 
sion, but as the boat touched shore, a wave broke 
over the stern and we hauled at the canoe until 
it was high on the beach. The sea kept increas¬ 
ing in fury. At sunset it was a veritable ocean, 
and we shuddered at the thought of being five 
miles offshore in our frail craft, heavily loaded. 
After an extremely good meal we turned in. It 
rained all night, but about 10 o’clock in the 
morning the sea abated sufficiently to make us 
decide to move on again. 
Ansel then complained of having a fever and 
left for home on the noon train. Jack and 
Johnny started south by canoe with a following 
sea and made below Essex at sunset. We were 
about to land, when a party in a launch hailed 
us and offered the use of their boat house for 
the night, which was accepted. In the morning 
we made arrangements to leave, but the high 
seas made it impossible to even get away from 
shore without swamping, so we had to be con¬ 
tented with a hike through the country to while 
H ere is the tale of an undersized moose 
hunter: 
It was on my second hunting expedi¬ 
tion that I achieved the feat of killing the big 
moose; my first effort having been made the year 
before in another section of New Brunswick on 
a trip full of hardship and misfortune, but one 
that afforded no better result for me than the 
sight of two cow moose, each with a calf, and 
the shooting of an old porcupine—just to get even. 
When my husband decided to make this 
second trip, he did not so much as suggest my 
going, thinking that I could not possibly be will¬ 
ing to face further exposure such as we had 
had the preceding year, but when I reminded 
him that I should like to at least be invited, he 
arose to the occasion and I promptly did the 
good sport act and accepted. 
So hurried was the preparation, and so in¬ 
adequate my outfit for the cold weather and the 
high-stepping over logs and into greasy puddles, 
that we bought at Bathurst No. 6 men’s 
moccasins, which fit me as neatly as a pair of 
boats, and in camp I built for myself, from a 
gray camp blanket, a wonderful pair of bloomers, 
wielding for the purpose the cook’s spike (meant 
for a needle) filled with heavy black cotton. If 
the moose had seen me, the shock alone might 
have killed him. 
Our camp was situated on Gordon Brook, a 
stream of many widths and depths and of de¬ 
cidedly serpentine trend. It was the full moon 
period, the weather clear and the woods glorious. 
After a few days’ unsuccessful and very chilly 
hunting we packed up things enough for camp¬ 
ing a night near “Dancing Pond,’’ a few miles 
above our camp. Peter, my gu'de, Fred the cook 
and I set out ahead in a big canoe, and my hus¬ 
band and his guide followed about half a mile 
behind. My two men paddled and poled and 
dragged the canoe through the varied waters of 
the brook, the guide in the stern and the cook 
in front, while I sat on a folded tent in the 
middle with my .38-55 carbine rifle on my lap. 
away the day. During the night we had a ter¬ 
rific rain storm, accompanied by a howling west¬ 
erly wind. The following day broke clear, how¬ 
ever, but a cold notrh wind kicked up such huge 
waves, that in passing a place. Shelving Rock, 
where we received the recoil, our boat was nearly 
swamped by a comber which broke over the 
boat at the center, but a bailing can saved the 
day. 
After rounding Button Island the lake was 
calm, and the wind died out entirely. At Port 
Henry the water took on a muddy color, and 
the scenery seemed to have lost its charm. Sun¬ 
set found us at Fort Ticonderoga, our day’s pad¬ 
dle having netted us thirty-eight miles. We 
hauled up the canoe and walked into the town 
of Fort “Ti,” about a distance of one and a 
half miles, where we made all kinds of foods 
disappear. During ‘the day w'e had each eaten 
two apples, which seemed to increase our hunger 
rather than to appease it. 
Her First Moose 
By MABEL W. RICHARDS 
The Head Illustrated on Front Cover. 
awaiting possible opportunity. For the most 
part we preserved the usual hunter’s silence, 
broken only occasionally by a little vainglorious 
boasting on the part of Fred—the little cook—as 
to how “he was pretty handy at the pole, eh, 
Peter?” and big Peter handed out generous 
praise. There was, however, perfect stillness 
when at about ii o'clock we were poling through 
CALLING A MOOSE. 
a portion of the stream wide and deep as a 
small river and at our left heard a sharp crack 
of a twig. In just a few seconds Peter ex¬ 
claimed, in a whisper, “Look! look!" I stood 
up and cocked my gun and looked—looked hard 
and listened to a great swish, swish, swish 
through the tall grass, until suddenly the whole 
horizon seemed to be filled with horns. And 
there, stock still, three-quarters broadside, stood 
the big moose. I took careful aim, first at his 
shoulder, according to instruction I had received, 
and then thinking to be on the safe side, pulled 
back a little and fired—straight through his 
heart! Another one of my instructions had 
been to “keep pumping lead,” so without a 
moment’s hesitation I pulled down the lever and 
On our return to the lake we had an oppor¬ 
tunity to oserve the moon, encircled by a halo, 
which to us spelled “rain,” but as no wood was 
handy, and the shore being rocky, we did not 
lake the trouble to erect the tent. At somewhere 
around three in the morning it began to rain, 
and quickly we put up the lean-to, with the aid 
of the paddles and a ridge rope which we 
weighted down with rocks. At daybreak it was 
raining heavy, but later on turned into a drizzle. 
However, we put off in our canoe, but had not 
covered two miles, when the heavens seemed to 
open over us, and we sought shelter under a 
shelving of rock. When the shower had slack¬ 
ened somewhat, we started off again and covered 
eleven miles more, reaching Putnam Station. The 
weather conditions continued unfavorable, and as 
we had practically reached the end of the lake, 
we boarded a train for home, having covered 
about 250 miles in our cruise through Northern 
New York. 
dropped out the shell and took another good aim 
at the moose which, without so much as turn¬ 
ing his head, had continued on his original course 
until he reached three-fourths of the way across 
the brook, and there stopped. But the gun would 
not go! My heart sank heavily enough. Peter 
snatched the gun. I was afraid the temptation 
would be too great and that he would shoot my 
moose. But he only closed the lever—the little 
detail I had overlooked—and handed back the 
rifle. Again I aimed and planted a shot close 
to the first one. With that the moose scrambled 
on to the bank and fell among the alders. “Pole 
up, Fred,” said Peter. “My God” (Canadian 
for dear me), “how can I pole?” said Fred, he 
that was “so handy.” Fred was saffron colored. 
He had been having a few bad moments through 
the belief that I would surely shoot him. But 
we got up alongside the moose and I shot him 
a third time and then—that great head with the 
sixty-three-inch spread of antlers fell back and 
it was all over. He died of an internal hemor¬ 
rhage, shedding not a drop of blood. 
I will not describe how I felt at this junc¬ 
ture—it might suggest something weak and ef¬ 
feminate, attributes that could not belong to a 
mighty huntress like me. And if I described 
Peter’s antics—well. I could not if I would. 
The moose was old and battle-scarred, his 
hair almost gray. The broken prong had a bullet 
buried in it. and when the head was skinned a 
splintering of the jaw bone was brought to light, 
evidently an old wound well healed. 
On our way back to camp Peter asked me 
how much I weighed. I told him 105 pounds. 
This pleased him so much that I predicted that 
as he could not make the moose larger than just 
sixty-three inches—the largest one taken out of 
that section for ten years—he would probably 
gratify his love of exaggeration by making me 
even less than my little 105, and that is just 
what he did do when we got back to Bathurst, 
knocking off the odd five pounds and leaving it 
an even hundred. 
