A Bear-Hunt in the Sierras 



The new crops have not yet grown, nothing 

 remains standing of the old but a few dead 

 stalks of weeds, the supply of alfalfa cut the 

 year before has long since been exhausted, 

 and, metaphorically speaking, the sheep and 

 cattle have to dine, as the hungry Indian is 

 said to do, by tightening his belt half a dozen 

 holes and thinking of what he had to eat week 

 before last. Only the weaklings die, however ; 

 the others become lean and restless, and as 

 eager as their masters to start for the moun- 

 tains. The journey supplies them with scant 

 pickings, just enough to keep body and soul 

 together, but morally it is a relief from the 

 monotony of starvation at home, and they 

 work their way stubbornly and expectantly up 

 the mountains and into the forest as soon as 

 the sun permits and anything has grown for 

 them to eat. The consequence of this close 

 grazing is that certain species of the grasses 

 upon which they feed are never allowed to 

 come to flower and mature their seed; hence 

 those with a delicate root, the more strictly 

 annual varieties, which rely upon seed for per- 

 petuation of the plant, have a hard time of it. 

 Where the sheep range, the wild timothy, for 

 example — a dwarf variety and an excellent, 



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