44 Hunting the Grisly 



flow of blood weakened the animal, so that it 

 finally fell exhausted, before being able dan 

 gerously to injure him. But it had bitten his 

 left arm very severely, and its claws had made 

 long gashes on his shoulders. 



Black bears, like grislies, vary greatly in 

 their modes of attack. Sometimes they rush 

 in and bite; and again they strike with their 

 fore-paws. Two of my cowboys were origi 

 nally from Maine, where I knew them well. 

 There they were fond of trapping bears, and 

 caught a good many. The huge steel gins, 

 attached by chains to heavy clogs, prevented 

 the trapped beasts from going far; and when 

 found they were always tied tight round some 

 tree or bush, and usually nearly exhausted. 

 The men killed them either with a little 32- 

 calibre pistol or a hatchet. But once did they 

 meet with any difficulty. On this occasion one 

 of them incautiously approached a captured 

 bear to knock it on the head with his hatchet, 

 but the animal managed to partially untwist 

 itself, and with its free forearm made a rapid 

 sweep at him : he jumped back just in time, the 

 bear s claws tearing his clothes after which 

 he shot it. Bears are shy and have very keen 

 noses; they are therefore hard to kill by fair 

 hunting, living, as they generally do, in dense 



