American Big Game in Its Haunts: The Book of the Boone and Crockett Club
History
American Big Game in Its Haunts: The Book of the Boone and Crockett Club
Big game hunting -- United States
After we had made our base of supplies on the shore of the lake, we
shouldered our packs and climbed up through the forest for several
hours, until we came to the shore of a small lake, where we made
camp. The scrubby woods were very thick, and extended up the sides of
the mountains for some distance; then came a broad belt of thick alders,
and beyond that the high open tablelands, which rolled back to the base
of the sheep hills. In all directions deep game trails, traveled by the
moose for many years, wound through the forest.
In the afternoon my man and I took our first hunt. Fresh tracks were
seen in the much-used runways, which were often worn two feet deep by
constant travel. Late in the afternoon I saw five sheep feeding on some
low hills at no great distance, and as there were no lambs among the
lot, we supposed that this was a band of rams, but we had not time to
reach them before dark.
We were just about to return to camp when Hunter saw glistening in the
sun among the thick alders, just above the timber line, the massive
antlers of a moose. There was no time to be lost if we meant to come up
with him, and so my man and I raced the entire way through the woods,
and then up the steep ascent, but failed to reach him.
When I started on this hunt I had a thorough understanding with Hunter
and my native that no one was to carry a rifle but myself, for I was
determined not to allow my natives to molest the game. Indians do not
like to wander through the forests without a gun, and my native had
lately borrowed a rifle from one of Blake's men, but I insisted upon his
leaving it at our base of supplies.
That afternoon, as Hunter and I started from camp, we sent the native
back to the lake to bring us more provisions. He told us that he had no
sooner reached the shore than he had heard a splash in the water near
him, and looking up had seen a large moose swimming across to a neck of
land at no great distance. He described this moose as at times being
completely submerged by the weight of his antlers, and said that he had
apparently great difficulty in swimming.
This temptation was too great for Lawroshka, and, as his rifle was at
hand, he pushed off in the boat, and coming up close to the moose, shot
him just as he was leaving the water. He offered to give me the head,
and seemed greatly surprised when I refused it, and told him I did not
wish to bring out any trophies which I had not shot myself. I was sorry
to learn that some men who have hunted in this region did not hesitate
to class among their trophies the heads which had been shot by their
men.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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