10 STALKS ABROAD 



raising their heads they paid no attention to him 

 at all. 



I spent one most amusing afternoon trying to 

 photograph some black bears, and though I only 

 got one good result out of about a dozen, I felt 

 more than repaid. Button was with us. He was 

 a most intelligent observer and took great interest 

 in the animals. I hoped to get some good photo- 

 graphs of live bears and sheep which he had taken, 

 but part of Fort Yellowstone was destroyed by fire, 

 and in it all his negatives and pictures, so I had to 

 go without. 



At first there was nothing to be seen in the 

 wood. We spotted the wrong end of one black 

 bear in the distance, but he very rapidly vanished. 

 About half a mile farther on we discovered another, 

 and started to surround him. On getting closer, 

 the whole of the little glade in which we had 

 disturbed him seemed literally alive with bears. 

 There must have been at least seven, scuttling 

 over the fallen timber like enormous black beetles. 

 Two got up trees in their first fright, but one of 

 these, as I tried to get closer, slid to the ground 

 and made off. Burton, however, succeeded in chas- 

 ing the other to the top of a fir by a well-directed 

 volley of fir cones and sticks. There he stayed in 

 a very bad temper, and spat and growled most 

 indignantly whilst we sat round the bottom of the 

 tree and made preparations to snap him. It was 

 then that we made the discovery that all our films 



