362 APPENDIX. 



what little powder remained, in a red half-pound canister of Curti 

 and Harvey's. I was alarmed, for I knew that my henchman would 

 only fire at vermin, and I started helter-skelter in the direction of the 

 firing. Fear accelerated my steps, for on my onward course I heard 

 two more shots, and what that meant, except in sign of distress, I 

 could not divine. On reaching the side of the hill, on the summit of 

 which I well knew that Peter had perched himself, I saw an object 

 which I readily recognised as a back view of the Indian actively 

 engaged. I rushed on and found this wonderfully powerful and 

 agile youth hauling along the carcase of a young bear. He was full 

 of smiles, and chided me for not coming to the battle. He had seen 

 a bear feeding on berries, and had given me the signal, but it must 

 have been at the time I was ofiP to the pair of moose, or — shall I write 

 it ? yes, truth is best told — perhaps it was when I slumbered. He 

 crawled down, and when about twenty yards distant had fired at the 

 animal. A second shot seemed at first to have proved inefiicacious, 

 when the flying bear suddenly dropped dead in her tracks. It proved 

 afterwards that the first shot had told, hitting high up in the lungs. 

 Hearing a noise to his right he looked round, and espied two young 

 bears in precipitate retreat. He made chase, when both treed simul- 

 taneously on the nearest * ram-pikes' — huge naked stems of burnt 

 pines, of which there was a bunch of five or six standing together. 

 Peter halted and loaded. He missed the nearest youngster with 

 shot number one, but the second brought it down dead from its; 

 perch. About fifteen yards from the spot there sat the other cub 

 on a projecting branch, which, on the Indian's approach, it left, and 

 clasped the trunk for a downward retreat. (Those who have not 

 witnessed it can form but a faint idea of the rapidity with which a 

 bear when scared can ascend or descend a tree.) Peter had no more 

 bullets, so what was to be done ? Well, his first attempt to kill young 

 *mooin' was with the stopper, or rather charger of the powder horn,, 

 which he rammed down into the right-hand barrel. This was a failure 

 and a miss. ' Mooin ' still clasped the tree in desperation. Eeflection 

 made Peter search his pockets, when therein he found a halfpenny — a 

 fitting remaining coin to be in an Indian's keeping. He sat down ; 

 and underneath the tree where the poor victim clung, aided by the 

 butt-end of the gun, which bears the well-indented marks to this 

 day, he doubled up that copper, drove it down over the powder in 

 the left-hand barrel, fired, and brought down the bear from its 

 perch. He had broken its near thigh — a frightful fracture ; but, 

 falling with three legs to work on, it took to the bush at a great 



