SOME EARLY EXPERIENCES (CONCLUDED.) 6 1 



The bear went into the air and then began tumbling and roll- 

 ing down the hill towards the tree that I was in, bawling and 

 snorting like mad. But if the bear made a howl from pain he 

 was in, it was no comparison to the howl that I made for help 

 and it did not cease until the men in camp came on the run think- 

 ing that I had accidentally shot myself. Well, this was my first 

 bear and it was the greatest day of my life. 



We took the bear to camp, skinned and dressed it and then 

 went to bunk for the night, but it was very little I slept for I 

 could only think what a mighty hunter I was (in my mind). 



The men came in in the morning with no better luck than they 

 had the night before, and they all declared that if I had not been 

 with them they would have had to go without venison. 



The men said that we had meat in plenty now and that we 

 would not watch the licks any more that time, so they put in 

 their time jerking the venison and also some of the bear meat. They 

 built a large fire of hemlock bark, and when it was burned down 

 to a bed of coals so that there was no longer any smoke, they 

 made a rack or grate of small poles, laid in crotches driven in the 

 ground, so as to have the grate over the coals, and then laid the 

 slices of venison on this grate and stood green bark about the 

 grate to form a sort of an oven. The strips of meat were first 

 sprinkled with salt and wrapped up in the skin from the deer and 

 allowed to remain wrapped in the skin for a few hours until the 

 salt would strike through the meat so as to- make it about right 

 as to gait. 



The men remained in camp about a week. They would shoot 

 at a mark, pitch quoits and have jumping contests and other amuse- 

 ments, including fishing, eating trout, venison and bear meat along 

 with toasted bread and coffee and potatoes roasted in the ashes. 

 * * * 



The time had arrived when I thought that I must take to the 

 taller timber to trap and hunt. I searched among the boys of my 

 age, in the neighborhood, for a partner who would go with me to 

 the Big Woods, as the section where I wished to go, was called. 

 I finally found a pard who said he would go with me and stay 

 as long as I cared to. 



