Bears I Have Met—and Others

ias "Old Bill," a man who had lived in the mountains for forty years and learned many things worth telling about. A new Win

feeble old intellect that things ain't naturally no account just because I never seen 'em afore. I stuck to it for a good many years that an old muzzle-loading rifle was the best shooting tool that ever was or ever could be made, but an ol

ncle tried to convince him that killing a California Grizzly was not as much fun as some folks pretended, but the Boston boy couldn't be convinced, and so the uncle hired me to go alon

e for it. While he stuffed his pump-gun I smoked and thought. 'Unless you go slow, Mr. Larkin,' says I to myself, 'you'll get into plenty of trouble. Here you are, mixed up with something that you don't sabe pretty well. A rough canyon, two hound dogs and an able-bodied bear is a combination that you can work, but when you throw in a college boy and a gun that winds up like a clock and shoots till t

saw the ground. The canyon was narrow and the sides were so steep that they tucked under at the bottom. While we sat there I figured a bit on what was going to happen. There was a light breeze, and presently I noticed something on the othe

et a wiggle on. Boston danced around in great excitement, and when I pointed to the black stump he was ready to see bears most anywhere. 'You take care of

The dogs and two bears were mixed up in some sort of disagreement about things in general, and I was in it, as the Dude would say, with both feet and a crutch. We got some tangled, but things came my way pretty soon, and when the bears were laid out I stopped to listen. The fight was still going on down the canyon. The boy is still holding his own, I tho

my way down the gulch through a cloud of smoke. Presently I came to the scene of the fray. Where my hero had made his first and last stand was a stack of empty shells and the pump-gun so ho

of hostilities was a giant sugar pine, the top of which had been broken off. Boston had shinned up that tree when his ammunition gave