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.

I went to sleep that night with the expectation of a fair day and good sport on the morrow, but woke next morning to find it raining hard.  Since reaching our hunting grounds on the 22d of August, we had had only five pleasant days, and three of these were used up in marching from one camp to another.  It was now raining so hard that I determined not to hunt, and turned in among my blankets with my pipe, but after a time this failed to satisfy me, and by 11 o’clock Hunter and I decided that even a thorough wetting was preferable to doing nothing.