The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1903-01-09
MY CHRISTMAS MOOSE.
BY GUSTAYE KORRE.

BY GUSTAvE KOBBE
call it my Christmas moose, but it
really was Helen's. And the best of it
all, was she knew nothing about it until
early Christmas morning she looked out
of her window and saw the great beast
with its superb antlers which we had
brought in on skin from Winoochee
camp.
A plain sort of fellow I am-just
plain enough to like nothing better than
to do something to please my wife.
"Jack," she said to me one evening, when
we were sitting together in the parlor,
II think q moose head and antlers would
look just fine over those folding doors.
But suppose it's too expensive. Mr..
Davis gave Agnes one last Christmas
that cost $780,"
"And that was not the right thing,
either" I said. ut was a sort of a
combination affair. You may not be-
lieve it, but those great antlers are shed
and grow out again every year. Those
i'll Agnes parlor were picked up in the
woods by Old Sabattis. and fitted to a
moose's head by taxidermist."
"Well," sighed Helen, they're hand
some enough as they are. I only wish
I had set like them"
I said nothing, and seemingly plunged
into my book again. 1t seemed as if she
had expected me to continue the CONVEX.
sation, for she looked at me for a few
moments and then at the lamp before she
gave another little sigh of disappoint-
ment and resumed reading "Aunt Han
nah's Recipes for Christmas Dinner"
1t is true I said nothing. But while I
appeared to be deeply Immersed in my
book, l really was keeping up a heap of
thinking. Helen, never in her life has
sighed twice without my doing something
to prevent her ever signing again for the
same cause.
The next morning I went to see Old
Sabattis. You don't know him? Then
you never can have followed the trail
of a moose on the Great Winoochee
range. Whoever has done that has at
least heard of Sabattis, if he has never
seen him. The old man is mighty
hunter, even though already in his '7Os
Probably no one man living has brought
down so many moose in a lifetime, or
"called'' so many for hunters as has old
man Sabattis.
He is a picture to look at, is the old
man. If an artist went out hunting with
him, he would drop his gun, take out his
pencil and sketch block, forget all about
moose and spenu all his time in camp or
out of it making sketches of Sabattis.
What a splendid head the old fellow has,
with great shock of white. tangled hair
like a grizzly grown gray in the forest.
And what strong lines furrow it in his
weather-beaten face, and eyes as keen as
any animals, and always on the alert.
I've never seen him clothed otherwise
than in the skin of wild beasts and
stump of an ancient clay pipe in his
mouth, with trapper's outfit slung over
his shoulder. For Sabattis traps as we'll
as shoots and lets no opportunity to get
game pass.
Sometimes wonder if he ever sleeps.
In camp when we doze off our last SEN
tent vision is of him fussing over the
camp fire, and the first thing we see when
we open our eyes in the morning, he is
freshening it up again and making a
blaze with rich, pitchy pine knots that
send genial glow through your whole
body and start the kettle singing in a
| few seconds. No, I don't think anyone
has even seen Sabattis asleep, and my
| belief that he never does so was con-
tirmed when went to see him the morn
ing after Helen sighed twice. For though
it was early, ne was as bright as but
| ton.
It was about ten days before Christ
mas. When came back from seeing the
old man and told Helen that was soire
for a weeks hunt on the Great Winoo-
chez range, she evidently had forgotte,
ali about the incident of the night before.
''Jack!" she exclaimed, reproachfully
| you'll never get back in time for Christ
mas. You wouldn't let Christmas pass.
away from me, would your" I assured
her that such a thing never could hap
pen. In the first place, a Christmas away
from her wouldn't be Christmas at all
so it couldn't pass until I got back. But
even so, didn't want the kind of Christ
mas that required an explanation, and
would be back on the actual day, in time
to breakfast with her.
And so Sabattis, Jerry, my brother-i in
law, and myself set off for the Great
Winoochee range. Everything, including
ourselves, had to be sledded in on skids
We knew we would be two days going
and coming, and tnat left us only Ger:
tain amount of time in camp. We got
to work at once with axes, choppine
down the ridge pole and supports for oul
tent, which we pitched on a high plateau
overlooking a frozen lake and a bit Of
valley to the white hills beyond, yet
pretty well sheltered from observatio,
! by a heavy growth of timber. This was
not my first moose hunt. But it was thu
first chance I'd had in years to go out TO,
moose when the antlers were at thei,
best and the moses coloring, too, Fol
it is curious thing that while almost
every forest creature is furnished By
nature with winter protection in q de,