THE INDIAN AND THE BEARS. 505 



fat, that he should come forth in the spring a melancholy pic- 

 ture of emaciation. 



The hlack hear is sometimes destroyed by blocking up the 

 mouth of the cave with logs of wood, and then suddenly break- 

 ing open the top of it, they kill the animal with a spear or gun. 

 This method is, however, considered both cowardly and 

 wanton, as the bear can neither escape nor offer the slightest 

 injury to his merciless destroyers. The northern Indians 

 display great ingenuity in the manner in which they throw 

 the noose around the neck of this animal ; but the barbarous 

 way in which they dispatch him with the hatchet or tomahawk 

 after having drawn him to the top of his hole, has little in it 

 to admire. 



Sometimes he is caught in traps, strong steel ones chained 

 to a tree and laid in a path which has been partially stained 

 with blood, by drawing a newly killed carcass along it. At 

 other times, a noose, suspended from a strong bough, is sub- 

 stituted for the trap, in a path similarly prepared. The bear, 

 whose sense of smell is exceedingly keen, always follows upon 

 the track along which a dead animal has been drawn, even al- 

 though it has left no trace perceptible by the human senses. 



The common mode of hunting this bear is by two or three 

 well-trained dogs. When he finds that he is pursued, he gene- 

 rally pushes forward for eight or ten miles, and sometimes 

 more, in nearly a straight course. But when the dogs come 

 up to him, he turns and strikes at them with his paws, the 

 blows of which are so severe, that one of them, taking effect, 

 would instantly fell the strongest dog to the ground. The 

 great art in training the dogs consists in teaching them to 

 avoid these blows, and keep harassing the animal till he is 

 exhausted. When that is the case, he climbs a tree, at the 

 root of which the dogs remain and "give tongue" till the 

 hunter makes his appearance. When the hunter appears, the 

 bear drops to the ground, not for the purpose of attacking 

 him, but of making a new effort at escape from the now in- 



43 



