A Bear-Hunt in the Sierras 



pointed hunter, as he hears him crashing 

 away, to moralize that company in the chase 

 halves the pleasure and doubles the sorrow. 

 The only safety where union is necessary 

 is to proceed with exaggerated and fantastic 

 caution. 



Leonard was a treasure in this. He had 

 dreamt of grizzlies all his life, yet had never 

 been in at the death. His heart was in the 

 hunt — he fairly sighed for gore. We crept 

 into the woods as silent as panthers and as 

 "purry" in the ardor of the chase. After a 

 mile or so our bear had come to an immense 

 fallen spruce, lying across the trail, with the 

 big butt, five or six feet in diameter, to our 

 right, the top pointing up the hill. Over the 

 middle of this, at right angles, lay another 

 large tree, with the point toward us. I felt 

 that behind the first of these, if I had been the 

 original and unmolested settler in these parts, 

 as the bear was, with all the world before me 

 where to choose, I should have made the bed 

 for my morning nap. It was long after day- 

 light when he had reached this covert. He 

 had doubtless been stirring soon after sunset 

 the evening before ; he had, it is not unlikely, 

 been traveling all night; had feasted heartily 



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