432 WALL STREET AND THE WILDS 



which my companion entered some twenty yards 

 to my right. It seemed a long time that I 

 walked and crept and peered about me in the 

 gloom of the forest, seeing nothing suspicious, 

 when suddenly — there stood motionless beside me 

 and not twenty feet distant the giant form of a 

 wonderful animal. 



It had been a fearsome apparition in my 

 dreams of the previous night, had tinged with 

 dread the hours of the morning ride, and made 

 my heart beat painfully at even the thought of 

 meeting him whenever I had entered the woods 

 in search of him. It was different now. The 

 prize was mine and my only fear was of losing it. 

 I thought long and much in that instant of rais- 

 ing my rifle. The whole creature was before me 

 with the lowered head pointed at me. Should I 

 send a bullet into the eye which I saw or through 

 the heart which I felt capable of doing? But the 

 head might suddenly move as I fired and grizzlies 

 traveled far with bullets near the heart. It 

 never occurred to me that his travel might be in 

 my direction, my only thought was that he might 



