“Well, Dol, I feel that you’re twitching all over with some question,” said Cyrus, detecting uneasy movements on the part of the younger boy who lay next to him. “What is it, Chick? Out with it!”
“I want to hear about moose-calling,” so spoke Dol in heart-eager tones.
The guide swung his body to the music of a jingling laugh.
“Oh; that’s it; is it?” he said. “You’re stuck on winning those antlers; ain’t you, Dol? Well, calling is the ‘moose-hunter’s secret,’ and it’s a secret that he don’t want to give away to every one. When a man is a good caller he’s kind o’ jealous about keeping the trick to himself. But I’ll tell you how it’s done, anyhow, and give you a lesson sometime. Sakes alive! if you Britishers could only take over a birch-bark trumpet, and give that call in England, you’d make nearly as much fuss as Buffalo Bill did with his cowboys and Injuns. Only ’twould be a onesided game, for there’d be no moose to answer.”
The young Farrars were silent, breathlessly waiting for more. The camp-firelight showed their absorbed faces; it played upon bronzed cheeks, where the ruddy tints of English boyhood had been replaced by a duller, hardier hue. On Neal’s upper lip a fine, fair growth had sprouted, which looked white against his sun-tinged skin. As for Cyrus, he had never brought a razor into the woods since that memorable trip when the bear had overhauled his knapsack; so the Bostonian’s chin was covered with a thick black stubble.
Neither of the youths, however, was at present giving a thought to his hirsute adornment, about which questionable compliments were frequently bandied. Their minds were full of moose, and their ears alert for the guide’s next words.
“P’raps you folks don’t know,” went on the woodsman, “that there are four ways o’ hunting moose. The first and fairest is still-hunting ’em in the woods, which means following their signs, and getting a shot in any way you can, if you can. But that’s a stiff ‘if’ to a hunter. Nine times out o’ ten a moose will baffle him and get off unhurt, even when a man has tracked him for days, camping on his trail o’ nights. The snapping of a twig not the size of my little finger, or one tramping step, and the moose’ll take warning. He’ll light out o’ the way as silently as a red man in moccasins, and the hunter won’t even know he’s gone.
“The second way is night-hunting, going after ’em in a canoe with a jack-light; same thing as jacking for deer. I guess you’ve tried that, so you’ll know what it’s like—skeery kind o’ work.”
Neal nodded an eloquent assent, and Herb went on:—
“The third method is a dog’s trick. It’s following ’em on snowshoes over deep snow. I’ve tried that once, and I’m blamed if I’ll ever try it again. It’s butchery, not sport. The crust of snow will be strong enough for a man to run on, but it can’t support the heavy moose. The creature’ll go smashing through it and struggling out, until its slim legs are a sight to see for cuts and blood. Soon it gets blowed, and can stumble no farther. Then the hunter finishes it with an axe.”