Two Thousand Miles for Moose 
and Caribou. 
On the night of September 7th, 1908, with a 
friend I started from home in Ridge Spring, 
S. C., on the long trip to Bathurst, N. B. It 
was our first visit to Canada for a moose and 
caribou hunt. 
Necessarily we had had quite a little corres¬ 
pondence before deciding on Bathurst as the 
place and Imhoff Bros, as guides. There being 
six of them, and as we only wanted two, we 
About that time we had a letter from the 
guides asking us if we had purchased our rifles 
as yet, and if we had not, they would be glad to 
know what we had in mind and that they would 
be glad to give us their expert advice. We 
wrote them, stating our preferences. They re¬ 
plied that those we contemplated purchasing 
were good rifles, but advised 35 cal. automatic 
rifles, and we took their advice. More of these 
arms later. 
Arrived at Bathurst, we spent Saturday and 
Sunday at the hotel. Monday I rose early to 
the tote road; and what a road! The way those 
horses went over it with their load was a re¬ 
velation to us. By taking a trail which was 
more direct we shortened the distance and 
struck it again after several miles and waited 
there for the team to catch up. On the way 
we saw our first moose track, a pretty big one 
too. After going twelve miles we came to the 
first camp, Wild Center, and a more fitting 
name it would be hard to find. There we spent 
our first night in the wonderful Canada woods, 
never to be forgotten. This camp, built like 
WJK 
CAMP WILD CENTER. 
engaged Gilbert and Alphonse. So far as we 
found they are all splendid fellows and excellent 
guides and cooks. 
We had no little trouble in deciding what 
kind of rifles to take for this special kind of 
game. We studied weight of bullets, velocities, 
trajectories, energy and such matters; read for 
months the arguments of different writers on 
the relative merits of large and small bore rifles, 
and after having read it all we were about 
where we started at the beginning, so far as 
being able to decide what was really best, 
whether 30-40, 303, 35. 405, 45-70 or 45-90 high 
velocity. I even wrote one of the celebrated 
manufacturers of Tifles for advice as to which 
of the company.s rifles were best for moose, 
but they answered by sending us one of their 
catalogues and expressed the hope that when 
we did buy, it would be one of their make, but 
did not offer any advice as to which one was 
best for moose. 
THE 
meet the guide at the station when the morning 
train came. A. C. Imhoff I found a very 
pleasant fellow indeed; in fact we found all of 
the guides competent and thoroughly good fel¬ 
lows. After breakfast, we having bought our 
licenses the day before from the post master, 
Henry Bishop, there was nothing to do 
but wait until Imhoff was through with his 
purchases, and finally were off to the Imhoff 
settlement, about twelve miles over a splendid 
road, so good in fact as to make one wish for 
an automobile, or better still a horse, in order 
that time could be had in which to enjoy the 
beautiful scenery along the road. 
At the settlement we donned our hunting togs 
and were ready for the great woods. With 
Gilbert and Alphonse we went to a field near 
the house to try our rifles, and found th<m to 
be very handy and accurate. The outfit having 
been loaded on Joe Doucet’s wagon, drawn by 
his two fine horses, we were at last ready for 
HUNTERS AND THEIR TROPHIES. 
all the rest, of logs, was the newest of their 
camps. It was built during 1908 and we were 
the first party to occupy it. It was quite late 
before we tired listening to the guides’ talk 
and ttirned in, for such sleep as we could get 
before day. 
Early next morning we left with Gilbert, Joe 
and Alphonse following with the team. Being 
in a splendid game country, we were now on 
the watch for game, and we saw plenty of 
moose, caribou and bear signs. Our destina¬ 
tion was Camp Big Moose, where we were to 
hunt. I carried a .22 caliber pistol for partridges 
and got several which, with trout caught near 
the trail in a splendid trout stream, constituted 
all the game we saw until we reached camp, 
about noon. When we got near enough to 
camp to see clearly we discovered that two of 
the windows had been broken, the bears having 
paid the camp a visit before us, and not know¬ 
ing how to raise the latch, went through thjes 
