eer, getting down to open the furnace door a
crack, "this is mair than murder ye're comin' at; it's a buitchery--or
else it's juist a pack o' lees."

"I give you my word," said Hemenway, "it's all true as the catechism.
But let me go on. The cow and the calf only stayed in the water a few
minutes, and then ran back through the woods. But the three bulls went
sloshing around in the pond as if they were looking for something. We
could hear them, but we could not see any of them, for the sky had
clouded up, and they kept far away from us. Billy tried another short
call, but they did not come any nearer. McDonald whispered that he
thought the one in the south end might be the biggest, and he might be
feeding, and the two others might be young bulls, and they might be
keeping away because they were afraid of the big one. This seemed
reasonable; and I said that I was going to crawl around the meadow to
the south end. 'Keep near a tree,' says Mac; and I started.

"There was a deep trail, worn by animals, through the high grass; and
in this I crept along on my hands and knees. It was very wet and muddy.
My boots were full of cold water. After ten minutes I came to a little
point running out into the pond, and one young birch growing on it.
Under this I crawled, and rising up on my knees looked over the top of
the grass and bushes.

"There, in a shallow bay, standing knee-deep in the water, and rooting
up the lily-stems with his long, pendulous nose, was the biggest and
blackest bull moose in the world. As he pulled the roots from the mud
and tossed up his dripping head I could see his horns--four and a half
feet across, if they were an inch, and the palms shining like tea-trays
in the moonlight. I tell you, old Silverhorns was the most beautiful
monster I ever saw.

"But he was too far away to shoot by that dim light, so I left my
birch-tree and crawled along toward the edge of the bay. A breath of
wind must have blown across me to him, for he lifted his head, sniffed,
grunted, came out of the water, and began to trot slowly along the
trail which led past me. I knelt on one knee and tried to take aim. A
black cloud came over the moon. I couldn't see either of the sights on
the gun. But when the bull came opposite to me, about fifty yards off,
I blazed away at a venture.

"He reared straight up on his hind legs--it looked as if he rose fifty
feet in the air--wheeled, and went walloping along the trail, around
the south end