Not far away he saw the first marten track in the edge of the spruce woods near the lake.  Farther on there were more.  This was very satisfactory indeed, and he observed to himself,

“The’s a wonderful lot o’ footin’, and ‘tis sure a’ fine place for martens.”

He went to work at once, and one after another the traps were set, some of them in a little circular enclosure made by sticking spruce boughs in the snow, to which a narrow entrance was left, and in this entrance the trap placed and carefully concealed under loose snow and the chain fastened to a near-by sapling.  In the centre of each of the enclosures a bit of fresh partridge was placed for bait, to reach which the animal would have to pass over the trap.  Where a tree of sufficient size was found in a promising place he chopped it down, a few feet above the snow, cut a notch in the top, and placed the trap in the notch, and arranged the bait over it in such a way that the animal climbing the stump would be compelled to stand upon the trap to secure the meat.

All the marten traps were soon set, but there still remained two fox traps.  These he took to a marsh some distance beyond the lake, as the most likely place for foxes to be, for while the marten stays amongst the trees, the fox prefers marshes or barrens.  Here, in a place where the snow was hard, he carefully cut out a cube, making a hole deep enough for the trap to set below the surface.  A square covering of crust was trimmed thin with his sheath knife, and fitted over the trap in such a way as to completely conceal it.  The chain was fastened to a stump and also carefully concealed.  Then over and around the trap pieces of ptarmigan were scattered.  This he knew was not good fox bait, but it was the best he had.

“Now if I were only havin’ a bit o’ scent ’twould help me,” he commented as he surveyed his work.

Foxes prefer meat or fish that is tainted and smells bad, and the more decomposed it is, the better it suits them.  Bob had no tainted meat now, so he used what he had, in the hope that it might prove effective.  A few drops of perfumery, or “scent,” as he called it, would have made the fresh meat that he used more attractive to the animals, but unfortunately he had none of that either.

As he left the marsh and crossed from a neck of woods to the lake shore he saw two moving objects far out upon the ice.  He dropped behind a clump of bushes.  They were caribou.

His gun would not reach them at that distance, and he picked up a dried stick and broke it.  They heard the noise and looked towards him.  He stood up, exposing himself for the fraction of a second, then concealed himself behind the bushes again.  Caribou are very inquisitive animals, and these walked towards him, for they wanted to ascertain what the strange object was that they had seen.  When they had come within easy range he selected the smaller one, a young buck, aimed carefully at a spot behind the shoulders, and fired.  The animal fell and its mate stood stupidly still and looked at it, and then advanced and smelled of it.  Even the report of the gun had not satisfied its curiosity.