A Charging Grizzly 93 



But Jack never got scratched. After the bear passed 

 the tree she went back to the creek, having now begun to 

 feel the effects of the first shot, which, entering her side, 

 back of the ribs, had ranged downward and passed out of 

 the groin between the hind legs. That it must have been 

 the first shot that struck her is proved by the downward 

 course of the bullet, fired from the bank when the bear 

 was in the creek. 



This is the only instance that I have ever known per- 

 sonally where a grizzly attacked a man without provo- 

 cation, and in this case I lay it to the dog. The bear was 

 an old one with three yearling cubs, and the presence and 

 barking of the dog were naturally offensive to her. And 

 as the cubs and the dog were doubtless the reasons for 

 her unprovoked attack upon the man, so also the cubs 

 and the dog proved his salvation. For the bear left him 

 again and again and returned to interpose herself between 

 the barking dog and her cubs, which had not crossed the 

 creek. 



In this case, too, the vitality of an old and large grizzly 

 proved to be many times less than that of the deer. Not 

 a bone was touched by this first bullet, and not another 

 ball hit her. Of this we were sure, as when we came to 

 skin her we examined her very closely. Jack was fully 

 convinced that he had hit her three, if not four, times; 

 and had she not been killed, he would have sworn that he 

 had so hit her, and that, in spite of her wounds, she had 

 made good her escape. Twice he had fired at her at a 

 point-blank range of thirty feet, and his last shot was 

 delivered when she was but ten feet away. This experi- 

 ence has, in my mind, raised the question as to how much 



