174 A SPORTSMAN'S EDEN. 



and kindly disposed to the strangers. By their 

 invitation I joined their party, and that the more 

 readily as I was informed that in the sport of 

 hounding, the stronger the party the better its 

 chances of success. Their guide, Dick Birch, 

 reputed the best in the locality, joined us on the 

 second day, and reported the country full of 

 sportsmen and very much shot out. His report 

 caused a change in our programme. Instead of 

 going to Blue Mountain, we stopped at Cedar 

 River, picking up two more guides on the 

 way. 



I confess I was not sorry to sit down by the 

 porch of the Cedar River inn with mine host, 

 and watch the coach bump out of sight, while we 

 puffed the cool tobacco-smoke and listened to his 

 yarns of a monster brown bear that had recently 

 smashed the traps of the lumberers and roused 

 the woods with his growling. Personally I am 

 of opinion that it would not be worth anyone's 

 while to go to the Adirondacks for bear, although 

 at Walkley's dam our guides said that they came 

 across fresh tracks. The covert is too dense to 

 get at the bears without dogs, and the guides 

 know too well the value of their hounds to let 

 them follow such dangerous quarry as Master 

 Bruin generally proves himself. ' Hounding ' is 

 the universal form of sport in the Adirondacks, 



