FOREST AND STREAM 
995 
and smaller. But I spotted this buck on the rear 
flank of the colump just as he emerged from the 
woods, and when he was right abreast of me 
and showing the biggest mark I got him fair 
behind the shoulder. He was making his best 
time at that point and I was not a little proud 
of the shot. 
This satisfied me, for the hunt was now be¬ 
coming slaughter, rather than sport. The ani¬ 
mals were breaking from the ranks and scatter¬ 
ing at the sight of their fallen mates and sheer¬ 
ing off from us as they came onto the river. 
Many left the woods far upstream, others turned 
in midstream and ran swiftly up the middle, to 
plunge into the woods on the north bank a half 
mile above the crossing. One actually came our 
way—I can’t say he charged us, for he seemed 
to have lost his head and was running wild. 
There was a shout from the huckies and several 
shots were fired point blank in his face. They 
missed him and he swerved back to the others 
and made the woods in safety. 
But not a one turned back. All tracks lead into 
the north. 
Walker and the huckies still fired and brought 
down six more after I had shot my last. They 
bad in mind the summer’s menu of traders’ pork. 
The bulk of the herd were past and now but 
a scattered two or three broke from the woods. 
These had already sensed their peril and with 
lots of room in which to manoeuvre came into 
the danger zone with a flying start. Only one 
fell to a lucky shot of Waly’s. But it was hard 
to look on and keep a rifle idle and the tempta¬ 
tion to pump lead at a heaving, glistening flank 
proved too much for my finer sensibilities. “I’ll 
pot the next one,” I said. Walker and the guides 
would do also, I knew, as a matter of course. 
He came, shot out of the woods as though 
impelled from a catapult, and his leap from the 
top of the south bank carried him well out into 
the trampled, blood-stained surface of the river 
snow. Gad! how he traveled! A volley from 
four rifles greeted him, but the lead never raised 
a hair. We fired again, yet he never stopped. 
Another volley and he had leaped to and made 
the other bank. Then, and then only, did he 
pause. It was but for the period of a heartbeat 
and no doubt he was only balancing after his 
uphill leap. But to us it seemed like a challenge 
and all four fired again. The caribou sprang, 
not upward as does sometimes a stricken deer, 
but ahead, and the woods had him safely in their 
keeping. “Well done!” I murmured, and was 
not sorry that the gallant beast had run the 
gauntlet safely. We knew he must have sprung 
just that saving fraction of a second ahead of 
our pulling trigger that gave him the start on 
the bullets. But the huckies swore that they felt 
the Guardian Spirit of the Land Animals brush 
their guns aside and they predicted that the kill 
was over. This, as usual, with a chuckle. Spirit 
or bad marksmanship, the caribou had made good 
his escape and the hunt was certainly over, for 
though we waited and watched the woods for 
another, none appeared. 
Walker laid his rifle down and fished in his 
pockets for his pipe. “We were certainly lucky 
to intercept them,” he said. “What a bully hunt 
it made! We missed both the first and the last, 
but we must have picked out a dozen in between. 
Let’s count ’em.” 
The tally was fourteen, with six stags among 
the number. I went back to where the corporal 
had fired his first, his “lucky” shot, and paced 
the distance to the caribou. Three hundred and 
eighty-two yards! Good shooting, that! At a 
word from Walker, three of the huckies com¬ 
menced hauling the carcasses towards the bank, 
for the meat would have to be cached among the 
trees. 
I suggested having the dogs perform the heavy 
work, but was told that the strength of the whole 
party would not be equal to holding the wolfish 
brutes back and that they would tear the game 
to pieces. As I listened I heard the team, where 
we had left them anchored, howling their lungs 
out. I went for my camera and found the dogs 
leaping wildly in their harness, crazed by the 
sight and scent of the fallen caribou. Their wolf¬ 
ish snarlings and bared fangs, the foam-flecked 
jaws and treacherous green light in their eyes 
told me that the wild hunting blood of the wolves 
which had sired them was uppermost and the 
blood lust was coursing through their veins. Not 
a little alarmed, I gave the brutes a wide berth 
and approached the sled from behind. Then I 
extracted the camera in a hurry. 
When I rejoined the hunters I found that Waly 
had made a short trip on the trail of the herd 
following some blood markings and had just re¬ 
turned with the news that a few hundred yards 
from the river a big stag lay dead, with a bullet 
through his lungs. One more we added to the 
score. 
Fresh venison steaks sizzled in the pans that 
night and there was great feasting in the land. 
The four natives sat late into the night, for the 
Eskimo, like his copper-skinned brethren, makes 
a business of his eating, and first, last and all the 
time attends strictly to the business. Half a 
deer carcass went into their house that evening 
and the following morning four oily, radiant¬ 
faced Eskimos emerged empty-handed. And no 
venison was left within. 
After considerable scouting we found four 
dwarfed evergreens bunched together and fifteen 
feet above the snow a platform was built and 
thirteen of the caribou cached thereon. 
We did not turn back from the North River, 
but traveled the remaining twelve miles farther 
on our course. Our way led through sparse 
woods in which the tree growth, stunted birches, 
willows and spruce, became ever rarer, and, with 
each succeeding mile into the north, shrunk in 
stature, till they were but leafless shrubs. The 
twigs and branches snapped in our hands as 
though dead and perpetually frozen. Each yard 
ahead our range of vision grew appreciably 
greater. Finally, shortly after noon, we came 
to the last lone outpost, a scattered bunch of 
leafless shrubbery. Beyond was nothing but snow. 
“The Barrens,” remarked Walker quietly. To¬ 
ward the west a dark line showed which he in¬ 
formed me was the edge of the tree growth and 
somewhere within its shade the caribou were 
making their way. Due north and to the east¬ 
ward as far as eye could see no object showed 
on the faint line that separated snow and sky. 
But for the rolling hummocks one might mistake 
the picture for that of the frozen sea. 
Yes, though April, it is still winter here, I 
thought, and then though my gaze wandered over 
a snowclad waste, bare and treeless, I called to 
mind a picture of this same land in late August, 
when the short sub-Arctic summer is at its height, 
and decided, as others before me had, that the 
“Barren Lands” were wrongly called. For the 
name is a misnomer when applied to a land where 
grow in profusion numerous luxuriant grasses, 
beautiful anemones and the Athacasca rose, wild 
(Continued on page 1023.) 
Another View of the Herd—It Is Estimated That Three Hundred Thousand Caribou Passed This 
Spot Within Two Days and Then They Were Still Coming. 
