"
I soon arrived on a level with the bay, and, plunging into the
ravine, I swung myself down from tree to tree, and then climbed
up the opposite side. I broke cover within a few yards of him.
What a splendid fellow he looked! He was about thirteen hands
high, and carried the most beautiful head of horns that I had
ever seen upon an elk. His mane was bristled up, his nostril was
distended, and, turning from the pack, he surveyed me, as though
taking the measure of his new antagonist. Not seeming satisfied,
he deliberately turned, and, descending from the level space, he
carefully, picked his way. Down narrow elk-runs along the steep
precipices, and, at a slow walk, with the whole pack in single
file at his heels, he clambered down toward the river. I
followed on his track over places which I would not pass in cold
blood; and I shortly halted above a cataract of some eighty feet
in depth, about a hundred paces from the great waterfall of three
hundred feet.
It was extremely grand; the roar of the falls so entirely hushed
all other sounds that the voices of the hounds were perfectly
inaudible, although within a few yards of me, as I looked down
upon them from a rock that overhung the river.
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