. It seems, if you're listening to it, to come
rolling--rolling--along the ground. Then it rises in pitch, and gets
impatient and lonely and wild-like, till you think it fills the air
above you, when it sinks again and dies away in a queer, quavery sound
that ain't a sigh, nor a groan, nor a grunt, but all three together.

"The call is mostly repeated three times; and the third time it ends
with a mad roar as if the lady-moose was saying to her mate, '_Come_
now, or stay away altogether!'"

"Joe Flint was right, then!" exclaimed Neal, in high excitement. "That's
the very noise I heard in the woods near Squaw Pond, on the night when
we were jacking for deer, and our canoe capsized."

"P'raps it was," answered Herb, "though the woods near Squaw Pond ain't
much good for moose now. They're too full of hunters. Still, you might
have heard the cow-moose herself calling, or some man who had come
across the tracks of a bull imitating her."

"But if the bull has such sharp ears, can't he tell the real call from
the sham one?" asked Dol.

"Lots of times he can. But if the hunter is an old woodsman and a clever
caller, he'll generally fool the animal, unless he makes some awkward
noise that isn't in the game, or else the moose gets his scent on the
breeze. One whiff of a man will send the creature off like a wind-gust,
and earthquakes wouldn't stop him. And though he sneaks away so
silently when he _hears_ anything suspicious, yet when he _smells_
danger he'll go through the forest at a thundering rush, making as much
noise as a demented fire-brigade."

"Good gracious!" ejaculated Neal and Dol together.

"Is the moose ever dangerous, Herb?" asked the former.

"I guess he is pretty often. Sometimes a bull-moose will turn on a
hunter, and make at him full tilt, if he's in danger or finds himself
tricked. And he'll always fight like fury to protect his mate from any
enemy. The bulls have awful big duels between themselves occasionally.
When they're real mad, they don't stop for a few wounds. They prod each
other with their terrible brow antlers till one or the other of 'em is
stretched dead. If a moose ever charges you, boys, take my advice, and
don't try to face him with your rifles. Half a dozen shots mightn't stop
him. Make for the nearest tree, and climb for your lives. Fire down on
him then, if you can. But once let him get a kick at you with his
forefeet, and one thing is sure--_you'll_ never kick again. Are you
tired