es that no
relief might reach him from the camp. Impressed with this conviction,
Basil began to feel serious alarm. Not despair, however--he was not the
boy to despair. His mind only grew more alive to the necessity for
action. He looked around to discover some means of escape. His gun lay
not a hundred yards off. Could he only get hold of the piece, and return
safely to the tree again, he could there load it and put an end to the
scene at once. But to reach the gun was impossible. The moose would
bound after and overtake him to a certainty. The idea of getting the gun
was abandoned.

In the opposite direction to that in which the gun lay, Basil perceived
that there were other trees. The nearest was but a dozen yards from him;
and others, again, grew at about the same distance from that one, and
from each other. Basil now conceived the idea of escaping to the
nearest, and from that to the next, and by this means getting back into
the thick forest. Once there, he believed that he would be the better
able to effect his escape, and perhaps reach the camp by dodging from
tree to tree. He could beat the moose for a dozen yards--getting a
little the start of him--and this he hoped to be able to do. Should he
fail in his short race, however--should his foot slip--the alternative
was fearful. _It was no other than death!_

He knew that, but it did not change his resolution to make the attempt.
He only waited for the animal to work round between him and the tree
towards which he intended to run. You will wonder that he did not prefer
to have the moose on the other side. But he did not, for this
reason--had the bull been there, he could have sprung after him at the
first start; whereas, when heading the other way, Basil believed he
could brush close past, and gain an advantage, as the unwieldy brute,
taken by surprise, would require some time in turning himself to give
chase.

The opportunity at length arrived; and, nerving himself for the race,
the hunter sprang past the moose, brushing the very tips of its antlers.
He ran without either stopping or even looking back, until he had
reached the tree, and sheltered himself behind its trunk. The moose had
followed, and arrived but the moment after, snorting and whistling
furiously. Enraged at the _ruse_, it attacked this tree, as it had the
other, with hoof and horns; and Basil nimbly evaded both by keeping on
the opposite side, as before.

In a few minutes he prepared himself