184 HORSE AND BEAM. 



direction, pursued by the dogs, and breaking and tearing 

 away the lianas and canes in his passage. My horse was 

 seized with a frenzy of terror much worse than his former 

 outburst. He would fain have gone forward ; but, turn- 

 ing and re-turning to disengage himself, he found himself 

 soon caught in a network of climbing and creeping shrubs 

 of all kinds, whose solidity would have defied the mus- 

 cular arm of a Samson or a Hercules. In this supreme 

 moment the bear again swept by me, harassed by the 

 dogs, who bit him in their rage. 



On catching sight of the ferocious animal the first, 

 perhaps, he had ever seen my horse began to recoil with 

 such nervous force, that I felt myself strangled and suffo- 

 cated by the pressure of the lianas which opposed my 

 retreat from the thicket. By great efforts, and with the 

 sacrifice of my coat-sleeve, whose tatters fluttered on the 

 reeds of the cane-bush, I contrived to release my arm, 

 and with the assistance of my bowie-knife cut away so 

 many branches, that I succeeded in forcing my way 

 out of the labyrinth in which I had been entangled. 

 I was then free to listen to the formidable concert of 

 iieighings, barkings, bowlings, and yelpings, in which 

 bear, and dogs, and horses sonorously joined. I did my 

 best to reach the scene of combat, which, as far as I 

 could judge, was at the foot of a gigantic tree. I dis- 

 tinctly heard the shouts of my hosts, and in due time 

 they and I arrived at the centre of operations. 



Suddenly Mr. John Morgan and I broke through the 

 hedge of canes which had obstructed our vision, and 

 before us, in the centre of a space of about twelve yards 

 in circumference, which had been cleared by the com- 

 batants, we discovered the bear attempting to haul his 



