222 WILD BEASTS AND THEIR WAYS CHAP. 



lying at every angle, iutergrown with the green boughs of younger 

 spruce. 



Bob Stewart wore moccasins, and being exceedingly light and 

 active, he ran up each sloping tree-stem for 40 or 50 feet, then 

 dropped nimbly to another fallen trunk below, bobbed under a 

 mass of heavy timber, like masts in a shipbuilder's yard, supported 

 as they had chanced to fall, and then dived underneath all sorts of 

 obstructions. He was followed admiringly, but slowly, by myself, 

 not provided with moccasins, but in high riding boots. If I had 

 been a squirrel, I might perhaps have beaten Bob, but after several 

 hundred yards of this horrible entanglement, which might have 

 been peopled by all the bears in Wyoming, we arrived at a small 

 grassy swamp in the bottom of a hollow, just beneath a great mass 

 of perpendicular rock, about 70 or 80 feet in height. In the 

 centre of this hollow was a pool of water, about 8 feet by 6. This 

 had been disturbed so recently by some large animal, that the mud 

 was still curling in dusky rings, showing that the bath had only 

 just been vacated. We halted, and examined this attentively. 

 The edges of the little pool were wet with the drip from the bear's 

 shaggy coat, as it had left the water. 



Bob whispered to me, " Look sharp, there are bears here, more 

 than one I think, and if they've heard us, they'll be somewhere 

 alongside this rock, I reckon, or maybe up above." We crept 

 along, and beneath the fallen timber ; but it was so dark, owing 

 to the great number of young spruce which had pushed their way 

 upwards, that a dozen bears might have moved without our 

 seeing one. 



We now arrived at a small open space, about 20 feet square ; 

 this was a delightful change from the darkness and obstructions. 

 The ground in this spot was a deep mass of pine needles, and in 

 this soft material there were three or four round depressions, quite 

 smooth, and about 18 inches deep; these were the beds of bears, 

 where in undisturbed solitude they were in the habit of sleeping 

 after their nocturnal rambles. 



I was of opinion that we had disturbed our game, as several 

 times we had accidentally broken a dead branch, with a loud 

 report, when clambering through the abominable route. However, 

 we crept forward round the base of the rock, and arrived in the 

 darkest and thickest place that we had hitherto experienced. 



At this moment we heard a sharp report, as a dead branch 

 snapped immediately in our front. For an instant I saw a large 

 black shadow apparently walking along the trunk of a fallen pine. 

 I could not see the sight of my rifle in the deep gloom, but I fired, 



