Old Ephraim, tlie Grisly Bear. 279 



A bull moose is even more formidable, being able to 

 strike the most liQ;htninQr-like blows with his terrible 

 forefeet, his true weapons of defence. I doubt if any 

 beast of prey would rush in on one of these woodland 

 giants, when his horns were grown, and if he was on his 

 guard and bent on fight. Nevertheless, the moose some- 

 times fall victims to the uncouth prowess of the grisly, in 

 the thick wet forests of the high northern Rockies, where 

 both beasts dwell. An old hunter who a dozen years ago 

 wintered at Jackson Lake, in northwestern Wyoming, told 

 me that when the snows got deep on the mountains the 

 moose came down and took up their abode near the lake, 

 on its western side. Nothing molested them during the 

 winter. Early in the spring a grisly came out of its den, 

 and he found its tracks in many places, as it roamed rest- 

 lessly about, evidently very hungry. Finding little to eat 

 in the bleak, snow-drifted woods, it soon began to depre- 

 date on the moose, and killed two or three, generally by 

 lying in wait and dashing out on them as they passed near 

 its lurking-place. Even the bulls were at that season 

 weak, and of course hornless, with small desire to fight ; 

 and in each case the rush of the great bear — doubtless 

 made with the ferocity and speed which so often belie the 

 seeming: awkwardness of the animal — bore down the 

 startled victim, taken utterly unawares before it had a 

 chance to defend itself. In one case the bear had missed 

 its spring ; the moose going off, for a few rods, with huge 

 jumps, and then settling down into its characteristic trot. 

 The old hunter who followed the tracks said he would 



