2 14 BIG GAME SHOOTING IN ALASKA chap. 



reaching the gully some 400 yards below where Pitka sat. 

 My drive would certainly have given me a good chance of 

 bagging the bear if it had not been for one circumstance. 

 This was that I did not go far enough down the gully, but 

 happened to select the very spot to take up my position at 

 which the bear was then feeding behind a dense clump of 

 thick willows. I started pushing my way through them, and 

 when well tangled up in the middle of the clump, Pitka 

 began whistling and pointing frantically down the gully 

 towards me. I stopped, naturally thinking he could see the 

 bear somewhere on my left, between him and me. After 

 looking that way in vain, I began to move again. At this, 

 Pitka began whistling and gesticulating afresh. I was furious, 

 since at that distance and angle I could not say where he 

 was pointing, and dared not shout and ask the fool where 

 the beast might be, as that would only have the effect of 

 driving it the wrong way. Utterly unable to see five yards, 

 for the jungle of bushes reaching just above my head, I 

 started to move again. Suddenly, close at hand, but on 

 my right side, and only a few yards away, I heard some big 

 beast crash into the bushes in front of me. Making a frantic 

 dash I pushed through into the open, only in time to see the 

 bushes moving as they closed behind the bear, which had 

 disappeared down the gully below me. Pitka soon arrived, 

 and explained that, after he first whistled, the bear had been 

 standing on its hind-legs not ten yards from me the whole 

 time. If he had had the sense to shout saying where the 

 bear was, I might have caught a glimpse of part of his body, 

 by looking in the right direction. As it was, my back was 

 almost turned to the animal, and I was intent on looking in 

 exactly the wrong direction. So ended my first misadventure 

 with the black bear. 



