"Deep in the silent forest, where oft I've chanced to roam,
The monarch moose inhabits, it is his woodland home;
By silent lake at morning, by logan, calm at night,
Majestic stands his lordship, stands motionless in sight.
The north wind to him is music, the tall pines are his friends,
The rivers madly rushing, o'er the rocks and round the bends,
Seems to him a heavenly blessing, seems to him the work above
Of a kind and thoughtful Father, and His beings He doth love."
BULL MOOSE IN BLACK POND.
(West Branch Waters.)
Photographed from Life.
CHAPTER I.
Habits and Haunts. Sections Where Found. Still Hunting. Calling. Possible Extermination.
Throughout the vast depths of the northern forests, bordered by the virgin growth of a trackless wilderness, often with an imperial fringe of timber-crowned hills, lives the moose. He is the largest, as well as the most highly prized, live game animal extant to-day on the American continent. Formerly, this species was very abundant throughout the region of country extending from the wilds of Northern Maine westward through the wilderness bordering on the Great Lakes and far beyond; but great havoc has been wrought, especially during the past twenty-five years, in the supply of this variety of game.
Comparatively few are killed annually in the United States, and those mostly within the limits of Northern Maine and the States of the far Northwest, where the pernicious activity of the professional hunters and self-styled sportsmen, who kill the large beasts during the prevalance of deep snows, will, if not checked, bring the moose into the list of extinct species of American game before the close of another decade.