A HUNT ON THE KINZUA. 



73 



until I could release the lever and let the weight onto the trigger. 

 I then put some poles onto the dead log to make doubly sure that. 

 I had weight enough to kill any bear that traveled those woods. 

 I now went to camp giving myself credit of doing a good job. 



When the boys came in the night of the day I built the first 

 deadfall for bear, they both reported seeing bear tracks and they 

 said the tracks all seemed to be going south. I told the boys that 

 the bear were looking up winter quarters, and that if we would 

 all go at it and put up several deadfalls we would stand a fair 

 chance .to get a bear or two, but it was no go. 



They said they would give me a clean title to all the bear I 

 could catch, but they did not care to invest. So I took the axe 

 and some bait and went to the head of a small draft where the 

 boys had seen the bear tracks. I found at the head of this hollow 

 what seemed to be a bear runway or crossing, for three or four 

 bears had passed around the head of this basin in the past few 

 days. 



With some hard work and heavy lifting I got another good 

 deadfall built that day. The next day I went the rounds of the 

 marten and mink traps, and I think I killed a deer and got two 

 marten. I remember that at this time we had a good snow to 

 hunt on, and that it was not an uncommon thing for us to cut 

 wood for the camp long after dark, and sometimes it was pretty 

 scant at that. I think it was the third day after I had set the 

 first bear trap when Will came in, shortly after Charley and I had 

 got to camp, and as he stuck his head through the hoghole (as 

 I called the substitute for a door) he says, a fool for luck. 



I suspicioned what was coming and said, "Well, what kind of 

 luck have you had?" 



W r ill said, "It is not me that has had the luck, but you have 

 got one of the Jed-blasted bears up there in that rigging you built, 

 you ever see." 



1 remember that I had some kind of a hipo that night, so that 

 [ would laugh every now and then "kindy" all by myself. I do 

 not think that I slept much that night, though it was not the first 

 bear I had ever caught. I thought it was beginning to look as 

 though the laugh was coming my way all right. 



