40 Hunting the Grisly 



Carson carried in the middle of the century. 

 There are exceptions to this rule of the rifle, 

 however. In the years after the Civil War 

 one of the many noted hunters of southwest 

 Virginia and east Tennessee was Wilber 

 Waters, sometimes called The Hunter of 

 White Top. He often killed black bear with 

 a knife and dogs. He spent all his life in 

 hunting and was very successful, killing the 

 last gang of wolves to be found in his neigh 

 borhood; and he slew innumerable bears, with 

 no worse results to himself than an occasional 

 bite or scratch. 



In the Southern States the planters living 

 in the wilder regions have always been in the 

 habit of following the black bear with horse 

 and hound, many of them keeping regular 

 packs of bear hounds. Such a pack includes 

 not only pure-bred hounds, but also cross-bred 

 animals, and some sharp, agile, hard-biting 

 fice dogs and terriers. They follow the bear 

 and bring him to bay but do not try to kill 

 him, although there are dogs of the big fight 

 ing breeds which can readily master a black 

 bear if loosed at him three or four at a time; 

 but the dogs of these Southern bear-hound 

 packs are not fitted for such work, and if they 

 try to close with the bear he is certain to play 



