Now that his ear was so close to the ground, he could plainly detect the uniform tread of a large body of light-stepping animals, but he dared not risk spoiling sport by raising his head to peer among the tree-trunks in front of him. In a few minutes a gun went off, half a mile to their left front, and was immediately echoed by one to the right, and another well ahead, whereat the trampling increased in speed and volume. Immediately the leader raised his hand to a perpendicular, and the redskins began to crawl on, worm-fashion, in two diverging lines. Weld started awkwardly to imitate them, but a strong hand caught him by the ankle and held him still. Screwing his head round, he saw that Strickland was his captor. "Hold on," whispered the Major. "We get our fun from this side." Another three minutes' silence followed, only broken by the tramp of the approaching herd, slower now, and more hesitating. "Now then; roll away or crawl away to your right, as far as you can, and as sharp as you can; and jump up when I open fire," whispered the old soldier, and Weld could see that, at a wave of his friend's arm, all the Englishmen were swiftly separating. He obeyed; but by the time he had covered a dozen yards, he became convinced that the Indians had all gone suddenly demented, for from every direction there arose a succession of demoniacal yells that almost drowned the crack-crack of the rifles that now sounded on his left. He leapt to his feet; not an Indian was in sight. The white men, all standing up, were blazing away as hard as they could, into an immense herd of bucks, which were falling in numbers out of all reasonable proportion to the shots fired. Then he discovered that, from the other three sides, the Ojibewas, lying in the long grass or crouching behind trees, were pouring volley after volley of arrows at the bewildered beasts, which, butting each other, were starting hither and thither, completely panic-stricken. "'Ware horns!" shouted the Major's son as, hurriedly butting his rifle, he felled an antelope that had charged despairingly at him; and very soon Weld was glad enough to follow the example, as a stout young buck rushed, head down, in his direction. More terrified now by the noise of the guns and the sight of the white men than by the arrows and shouts that proceeded from the other three points of the compass, the herd turned to flee back towards the hills. But this was only the signal for every Indian to spring erect and brandish his long spear. That effectually broke up the herd; the distracted creatures squeezed a passage for themselves wherever they could, and fled out of sight, leaving a good half of their number to be carried back to the farm in the waggons which were now on their way to the scene of the battue. CHAPTER XXI CHIPPEWYANS AND COLUMBIAN GOLD-DIGGERS