It may be that even that little snapping sound angered the moose; or possibly he was just in a mood for trouble. The rutting season was well over by this time of year, and his horns had grown fairly stout, so that they could be trusted to do good service in battle. Phil never knew. In fact he had no opportunity to make inquiries, or conduct any sort of an investigation. All he became aware of suddenly was that the bull moose had lowered his head, and started toward him at a full gallop. Now Phil may at times have been called a bold sort of a boy, but he also had a pretty well defined streak of caution in his make-up. Those towering horns had an ugly look to him. He could easily imagine how inconvenient it would seem to feel them brought into personal contact with some part of his body, with all that muscular power of the big animal butting them on. There was only one thing left for Phil to do, and that was to make himself scarce around that neighborhood as quickly as possible. Although the boy had never in all his life witnessed such a thing as a genuine bull fight, he understood that the first thing to be done was to dodge. The moose was so close to him that he knew he had very little chance of outstripping those long legs in fair flight. With this partly formed plan in his head Phil ducked to the left, and started to run. He could have no real motive in choosing this side, because there was no time to take even a quick observation, and form a plan of action. As it turned out luck favored him in making this hasty choice on the spur of the moment. Had he turned to the right he would have been compelled to cover such an extensive strip of open ground that his fleet-footed enemy must have easily overtaken him. That would have forced Phil to make another side movement, or else be caught up in those branching horns. He knew what this latter must mean, and that once he found himself knocked down and rendered helpless, he would be rolled along, prodded wickedly, and even jumped upon in the endeavor to disable him. On the left, though, there were trees close to him that offered some sort of refuge. Phil, hearing the moose putting after him at full speed, hastened to swing his body around the first of the trunks he came to. It would offer a barrier against the attacks of the animal until he could get his wits about him, and figure out some plan. A minute later and the moose was chasing him around the tree in a merry way. All the games Phil had ever played with his schoolmates in days gone by were not a circumstance to the one he found himself engaged in with that determined animal. The more he was disappointed at reaching his supposed enemy the greater became the fury of the moose. He stamped, and whistled, and butted his head against the tree; after which he would start on another fast trot around it, the performance consisting of perhaps a dozen or a score of circles.