I/O BIG GAME SHOOTING IN ALASKA .chap. 



on the chance of seeing a black bear. There were evidently 

 plenty of these beasts about, as all along the river- banks 

 there were numerous fresh tracks, and spots where they had 

 pulled out and eaten salmon. 



But on both sides of the river grew a dense jungle of 

 high grass, alders, salmon berry bushes, and that vile, prickly 

 plant called in Alaska " Devil's Club," through all of which 

 the native and I were obliged to force our way. It would 

 have been impossible to see a bear at lo yards' distance, as 

 the undergrowth was over our heads. To make matters 

 worse, the mosquitoes and a small kind of midges were 

 swarming. About three hours' waiting patiently on the bank 

 without seeing anything was enough for me, and we made 

 tracks for the bidarki, and home again. 



On arrival at Saldovia we heard that Mr. h.. J. Stone 

 was there, accompanied by a professional taxidermist from 

 New York, and also an artist, Mr. Browne. Shortly after 

 we met them, and had an opportunity of inspecting some of 

 their trophies and specimens of small mammals and birds. 

 They had been successful in making a very fine collection, 

 and had also killed ten brown bears, and captured one cub 

 alive in Moller Bay on the Alaska Peninsula. Mr. Browne 

 told me a curious incident which happened when he 

 killed one of the large bears. He said that close to the spot 

 where the bear lay dead, he noticed a big excavation in the 

 ground, and on examining it found the whole body of a large 

 caribou which had just been buried there by the bear. A day 

 or two previously they had shot at and wounded a caribou 

 near this place, and he thought that this was the one which 

 the bear had killed and buried. I had several long and inter- 

 esting conversations with Mr. Stone, whose knowledge of the 

 mammals of Alaska is perhaps more extensive than that of 



