of the great eagle owl at night. Woodpeckers were also very scarce in the forest, and I only once saw and shot the great black woodpecker in Nam- dalen. One of the most familiar birds was the Siberian jay, which is as tame and inquisitive here as everywhere in the northern forests. Cross¬ bills and finches were scarce; magpies were everywhere common and much tamer than in England. Ravens were seen and heard almost every day, whilst tits, pipits and wagtails were the commonest small birds.
As regards mammalia there was also a great scarcity. I never saw a glutton, lynx or marten, though they all exist in the district. Blue foxes were fairly common on the high fjeld but not often seen. Hares were not at all plentiful. Squirrels, much darker in colour than in England, were also scarce. One of the most interesting animals which still occurs in a very few places in South Norway is the beaver, which, thanks to the representations of my friend Professor Collett of Christiania (Oslo), is now strictly preserved. He has published an excellent account of their habits.
At this time I had no knowledge of the habits of elk, and the farmers of Upper Tydal were not experienced hunters, so as we heard that the lower lying forests were more easy to hunt than the high ground, which I after¬ wards found is not the case, we returned to Selbo for the 1st September, which was the opening day. I started out in a carriole with Peter Norbyc at daylight for my first day’s elk hunting, which was to be at a farm six miles away, where the farmer told us that elk were often feeding almost among his cows. And this proved to be true, for in a very short time we found a barren cow-elk and a two-year-old bull feeding on a ridge not far off, and watched them as the cows with their herd passed along below them not 100 yards off, only stopping their browse on the young mountain-ash, which at this season is their favourite food, for a few minutes till the herd had gone by. By making a short circuit, we succeeded in getting within thirty yards of the elk, which, however, I could only see parts of among the thick bushes, and as meat was the main object on this occasion, I fired and wounded the cow. Peter slipped his dog, which was young and inexperienced, and soon came back to us, and we followed the tracks of the cow in a manner which I now know to be futile. But fortune often favours the inexperienced hunter, and as after two or three hours’ tracking we found that she was going round and round, it was suggested that the farmer’s son, who was with us,‘should show me a ford in the river much used by elk, and leave me there whilst he followed up the track with Peter.
I had not been waiting more than half an hour when I heard a shot not far off, and almost at once the elk appeared at the edge of the forest and came trotting over the clattering stones of the ford. I had a very easy shot at fifty yards and killed her dead, to the great delight of the fanner, who, like most of his kind, preferred a fat cow weighing perhaps 600 or 700 pounds, to the finest bull-elk in Norway, After butchering the elk and drinking coffee at the farm, where the people were—as I have always found them—friendly and hospitable, we drove home in triumph, and I began to think that elk hunting was an easier form of sport than I had supposed, The next day we arranged with the ladies to meet us
