“The man with the oats fell back with wonderful alacrity, and the fellows who carried halters seemed bent upon effacing themselves in the humblest manner possible. One tall, gray-shirted woodsman, however, stepped to the front, raised his rifle, and drew a bead upon the approaching fury, while two or three of the others held their shots in reserve. There was a moment of breathless suspense. Then the fine, thin note of the woodsman’s rifle rang out; and the stallion sprang aside with a shriek, and stumbled forward upon his knees. Almost instantly, however, he recovered himself, and rushed upon his opponents with undiminished ferocity. I held my breath. He was almost upon the party now. Then two more rifles flashed from the marksmen standing moveless in their tracks, and the mad brute rose straight up on his hind legs, and fell over backward, dead.
“I stepped out to welcome my rescuers, and detailed to them my adventures. They had been wondering who or what it was that the brute was laying siege to. There was so much, in fact, to talk about, and I found myself for the moment so important a figure, that I returned to Maybury for that evening, and there had to retell my story at least a score of times.”
“If it’s my turn now—and I suppose it is,” said Ranolf, “I can’t pretend to give you anything so blood-curdling as this story of Magnus’s; but I’ll do my little best to make an angry bull moose as interesting as a mad stallion. Take this down, O. M., as—
‘AN ADVENTURE WITH A BULL MOOSE.’
“I don’t know much about the lumber-camps; but I got this from a Restigouche lumberman, so of course it must be true.
“One day a woodsman, who had been on a long tramp prospecting for prime birch timber, rushed into a camp on the Restigouche with news that he had discovered a ‘yard’ of moose.
“A ‘yard’ it may here be explained, is an opening in the forest where a herd of moose has trampled down the snow and made its headquarters. The yard is always surrounded by young trees, upon whose succulent shoots the moose feed. It forms a striking scene—the animals lying about the space of trampled and discolored snow, while here and there a magnificently antlered bull towers above the rest, keeping watch; and here and there on the edge of the yard an animal is reaching aloft its long, prehensile lips to tear down its meal of green branches.
“Now, the news which the inspector brought into camp created an instant interest. Fresh meat was at a premium in the Restigouche Camp; and at the thought of moose-meat, which is a sort of beef idealized, every lumberman’s mouth began to water longingly. The boss was quite at one with the hands in this respect; wherefore it was not long before a hunt was organized.
“Only those men could take part who had snowshoes, for the snow was deep that season. So there was a small muster of five; but with those five went the blessings of the camp. Upon their success hung the hopes of all their hungry comrades.
“The wind, fortunately for the hunters, was blowing from the yard to the camp, so that it was not necessary to take a roundabout course. The expedition was led by the prospector, who was an enthusiastic hunter, and skilled in woodcraft.