mps and rough wild meadows.

As the second potato-digger was lifting his plug of tobacco to his
mouth, his hand stopped half way, and his grizzled jaw dropped in
astonishment. For a couple of seconds he stared at the ragged
hill-crest. Then, it being contrary to his code to show surprise, he
bit off his chew, returned the tobacco to his pocket, and coolly
remarked: "Well, I reckon they've come back."

"What do you mean?" demanded the first speaker, who had resumed his
digging.

"There be your moose, after these eighteen year!" said the other.

Standing out clear of the dead forest, and staring curiously down upon
the two potato-diggers, were three moose,--a magnificent, black,
wide-antlered bull, an ungainly brown cow, and a long-legged,
long-eared calf. A potato-field, with men digging in it, was something
far apart from their experience and manifestly filled them with
interest.

"Keep still now, Sandy," muttered the first speaker, who was wise in
the ways of the wood-folk. "Keep still till they git used to us. Then
we'll go for our guns."

The men stood motionless for a couple of minutes, and the moose came
further into the open in order to get a better look at them. Then,
leaving their potato forks standing in their furrows, the men strode
quietly down the field, down the rocky pasture lane, and into the
nearest house. Here the man called Sandy got down his gun,--an old
muzzle-loading, single-barrelled musket,--and hurriedly loaded it with
buckshot; while the other, who was somewhat the more experienced
hunter, ran on to the next cabin and got his big Snider rifle. The
moose, meanwhile, having watched the men fairly indoors, turned aside
and fell to browsing on the tiny poplar saplings which grew along the
top of the field.

[Illustration: "A MAGNIFICENT, BLACK, WIDE-ANTLERED BULL, AN UNGAINLY
BROWN COW, AND A LONG-LEGGED, LONG-EARED CALF."]

Saying nothing to their people in the houses, after the reticent
backwoods fashion, Sandy and Lije strolled carelessly down the road
till the potato-field was hidden from sight by a stretch of young
second-growth spruce and fir. Up through this cover they ran eagerly,
bending low, and gained the forest of rampikes on top of the hill.
Here they circled widely, crouching in the coarse weeds and dodging
from trunk to trunk, until they knew they were directly behind the
potato-field. Then they crept noiselessly outward toward the spot
where they had last seen the moose. T