We had not to wait long. I saw something black on the snow. Certainly the animal was not a white fox. It could not be the cub of a bear, for it was the Bear's Night and they were all asleep. When the animal was near enough I fired and it fell. I ran towards it, and saw that it was a splendid silver-gray fox. How carefully we skinned the animal!
The next day Jakob made a lot of traps for ermines. These traps are made in the following manner: A string is attached to a loop long enough for the head of the animal to pass through. The string is fastened to a branch, which is bent down above the place where meat is deposited, some distance back of the loop. The ermine approaches, and in trying to reach the meat pushes his head through the loop and pulls the string up, and the loop tightens round the neck and strangles the animal in the air.
We scattered these traps in every direction, and caught many ermines. How pretty is the ermine, with its short legs, white fur, and tail tipped with black! The ermine feeds much on the ptarmigans.
That day I saw perched on the low branch of a tree a beautiful snowy owl, motionless, evidently watching for something. Jakob said to me, "The owl is watching for ermines. There are plenty of these, I am sure, round here, or the owl would not be on this tree. We will set some of our traps here." The owl was big and beautiful, and I said to myself, "The ermine feeds on the ptarmigans, and the owl on the ermine." I did not like the idea of the harmless ptarmigans being eaten by ermines and owls, so I raised my gun and knocked him over.
The foxes, after being hunted for two or three days, became very shy and it was impossible to get near them. There were a great number of ptarmigans, and they were so tame that we had no difficulty in getting many for food.
Strange to say, when we fired our guns they made hardly any noise, for the air was so rarefied. We feasted well at our camp, for we also killed a number of white hares.
The white fox had become so scarce that we concluded to leave our camp for good, and Jakob went to get our reindeer. After packing we retraced our steps towards his home, his tent on the snow.
In one place where we stopped to rest I suddenly noticed that our reindeer had got loose. I shouted to Jakob, who was quietly taking a little snooze on the snow, "Our reindeer are loose!"
Without saying a word, he went to his sleigh and took a lasso. The Lapps never travel without a lasso. This reassured me. "I must be very wary, for our reindeer are somewhat wild," Jakob said; "Paulus, follow me." So I took to my skees. As we approached the animals moved off from us. Then he came near enough to one of them, and threw his lasso and caught him. After making the animal fast, he went carefully after the others and succeeded in lassoing them.
"Well done," I said to him. Then we lay on the snow, with our masks to protect our faces, and went to sleep. After a short nap we continued our way, and finally reached Jakob's tent just in time for supper, and were warmly welcomed by the family.