For we had
several lines of traps, which covered big distances in various
directions; and on Monday morning I used to start one way, and my chum
another, to visit these. Generally it took us five or six days to make
the rounds of them. While we were on our travels we'd sleep with a
blanket round us, under any shelter we could rig up,--a few
spruce-boughs or a bark hut. When the snow came, we were forced to
shorten our trips, so as to reach one of the home-camps each night.
"Well, it was early in the season, one fine fall evening, that I was
crossing Togue Ponds in a canoe. I had been away on the tramp for a'most
a week; and though I had a rifle and axe with me, I had nary an ounce
of ammunition left. All of a sudden I caught sight of a moose, feeding
on some lily-roots in deep water. Jest at first I was a bit doubtful
whether it was a moose or not; for the creature's head was under, and I
could only see his shoulders. I stopped paddling. I tried to stop
breathing. Next, I felt like jumping out of my skin; for, with a big
splash, up come a pair of antlers a good five feet across, dripping with
water, and a'most covered with green roots and stems, which dangled from
'em.
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