Jan. 6, 1906.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 


a comfortable tent, no matter how cold the 
weather. This does not seem like roughing it. 
The frontiersman of former days would have 
thought such comfort with a hunting outfit im- 
possible. Modern progress, however, has caused 
most of the inconveniences of camp life to disap- 
pear as if by magic. , Would that its magic influ- 
ence could repeople the wilderness with the great 
herds of wild animals that have vanished. 
The following day I went out with the guide 
to try my luck. We had not traveled more than 
two miles before discovering a small herd of elk. 
We circled around them sufficiently to size them 
up, but could find no heads worth picking out. 
Our course was then changed, and we hunted to- 
ward a high mountain north of Mt. Leidy; from 
this point we obtained a fine view of the sur- 
rounding country, which I carefully swept with 
my Seitz glasses in quest of game. Far off on a 
distant ridge we finally saw some elk slowly mov- 
ing out of the timber into the open. Their 
brown shapes showed very distinctly against the 
snow-covered hills, but, although there was a 
considerable number in view, no good antlers 
were visible. My strong glasses proved of very 
great service to me. With them I could ascertain 
plainly what otherwise I would have had to guess 
at, and they saved me many a long excursion 
over rough country to determine the value of a 
set of antlers. My guide was quite as anxious 
as myself that I should not have any trophies 
unworthy of a sportsman’s ambition. The law 
allows one only two heads, and it is necessary 
to take great pains to avoid making mistakes. 
I made up my mind that I would go back empty- 
handed sooner than pack out antlers which would 
reflect discredit upon my skill. The guide was 
particularly anxious that I should obtain speci- 
mens which would do no injury to his reputation. 
I think I must have passed unfavorable judgment 
upon twenty-five or thirty heads—for -which the 
guide was mainly responsible—before I finally se- 
cured my trophies. Any number of bulls pre- 
sented themselves, some of them quite easy 
marks, only to be snubbed and turned down. 
Paris, in passing judgment upon the goddesses, 
to determine which was the most beautiful, could 
not have been more critical or discriminating 
than the guide. I doubt if the unsuccessful rivals 
_ of the bulls I finally chose as worthy specimens 
were seriously disappointed. 
To illustrate the ease with which I could have 
secured my legal allowance of two bulls, to say 

PACKING. 
Photo by E. F. Randolph. 

HITTING THE TRAIL. 
Photo by E. F. Randolph. 
nothing of cows, I will cite a few instances of 
the opportunities I had. On one occasion I was 
going through the timber where I heard a num- 
ber of elk; the guide called my attention to a 
bull lying on the ground not sixty yards away, 
partly concealed by the spruce brush; he was 
facing directly toward us, his front feet folded 
under his body and his nose close to the ground. 
We stood quite still and surveyed him carefully, 
sizing up the head, which had twelve points, but 
not large nor heavy at the base. The glasses 
were brought into service to make a more critical 
examination. A couple of minutes we stood dis- 
cussing him, when finally he gave a brief snort, 
which sounded like an expression of disgust at 
our impertinence, and then jumped up and loped 
out of sight. 
Shortly afterward we managed to approach 
close to a very large herd of elk, mostly hidden 
in the timber. From our concealment we could 
see a number of the animals not over thirty or 
forty yards away. About 150 yards off were a 
couple of young bulls exercising their skill by 
fencing with their antlers, evidently in sport. We 
could hear the frequent clash of the horns and 
often got a good view of the contestants. We 
waited in this spot over an hour until despairing 
of seeing anything worth shooting at before it 
grew too dark we suddenly rose up in plain view. 
The peaceful scene was soon converted into one 
of great confusion. For a moment the elk stared 
at us with their beautiful large brown eyes in 
astonishment, then a general panic communi- 
cated itself to the herd, every animal ‘in sight 
began moving off; each clump of vegetation that 
could conceal a form seemed suddenly animated 
by a creature breaking from its hiding place, flee- 
ing for safety; the cows and calves gave vent 
to their peculiar bleat of alarm, while the bulls 
snorted and rattled their antlers against the trees 
in their haste. For some hundred yards in the 
timber, and well up on the mountain side, the 
scene became particularly animated. I hurried 
to an opening in the timber, where I could get 
a good view of the retreating herd, which had 
drawn together into quite a solid moving mass. 
The number of elk greatly exceeded my expecta- 
tions. Nine-tenths of the herd had been as care- 
fully concealed from us as we had been from 
them. There must have been at a conservative 
estimate not less than 4oo in the herd, and pos- 
sibly 500. A sportsman could only admire this 
striking and beautiful spectacle, because there 
was no head worth securing. A tooth-hunter or 
a butcher with a high power repeating rifle could 
have repeated one of those scenes which sickens 
every lover of sport. 
At another time I came upon a band of elk 
quite as numerous, and, although there were a 
couple of good heads in view, yet the number of 
cow elk was so great that it was practically im- 
possible to get a good shot. The entire mass 
fled straight up the side of a steep mountain cov- 
ered with quaking aspen and spruce; for some 
time we could see them crowding one another in 
dense masses in their ascent, but the only shot 
attempted was with the camera, but without suc- 
cess. One more instance which will not only aid 
in proving the ease of securing an indifferent 
specimen but goes to show that when game 1s too 
plentiful it is an actual handicap to the sports- 
man. I saw a fine head across a gulch at a con- 
siderable distance. I fired and missed it and the 
animal escaped beyond range. I crossed the gulch 
to examine the spot where the bull had stood and 
followed his tracks to see if he had _ been 
wounded, and, if so, how badly. Although the 
ground was covered with two “eet of snow, yet I 
could discover no signs of. 90d. While dis- 
cussing the matter with th ‘uide we became 
