then away to the woods for the gray-green hanging moss that grows on
the spruces. Here is a fallen tree half covered with the rich food.
Megaleep nibbles a bite or two, then wanders away and away in search
of another tree like the one he has just left.

And when you find him at last, the chances are still against you. You
are stealing forward cautiously when a fresh sign attracts attention.
You stop to examine it a moment. Something gray, dim, misty, seems to
drift like a cloud through the trees ahead. You scarcely notice it
till, on your right, a stir, and another cloud, and another--The
caribou, quick, a score of them! But before your rifle is up and you
have found the sights, the gray things melt into the gray woods and
drift away; and the stalk begins all over again.

The reason for this restlessness is not far to seek. Megaleep's
ancestors followed regular migrations in spring and autumn, like the
birds, on the unwooded plains beyond the Arctic Circle. Megaleep never
migrates; but the old instinct is in him and will not let him rest. So
he wanders through the year, and is never satisfied.

Fortunately nature has been kind to Megaleep in providing him with
means to gratify his wandering disposition. In winter, moose and red
deer must gather into yards and stay there. With the first heavy storm
of December, they gather in small bands here and there on the hardwood
ridges, and begin to make paths in the snow,--long, twisted, crooked
paths, running for miles in every direction, crossing and recrossing
in a tangle utterly hopeless to any head save that of a deer or moose.
These paths they keep tramped down and more or less open all winter,
so as to feed on the twigs and bark growing on either side. Were it
not for this curious provision, a single severe winter would leave