METAPHYSICS OF BEAR HUNTING. 859 



moss. In another instant ^ he had fired two shots in quick 

 succession. The idea of losing my shot entirely, made me 

 desperate, and reining the horse's head with all my strength, 

 I plunged the spurs furiously into his flanks. 



Three or four frantic bounds, and he had brushed through 

 the dense moss curtain under the live oak, and came throuf^h 

 on the other side, within five paces of the object of his terror, 

 the bear, the loins of which had been broken by the two 

 shots, and it was swaying its huge carcass to and fro, and 

 gaping its great red mouth with roars. 



Had my horse been suddenly turned to stone he would not 

 have been more rigid than he became the instant his feet 

 touched the earth. There was something positively awful 

 in the paralysis of fright which seized him. His skin had 

 been perfectly dry, and in a second, big drops had started, 

 running off to the ground. His legs were set and stiflF; his 

 nostrils prodigiously distended, but motionless ; his eyes shot 

 out, and fixed, in the fascination of terror, upon the hideous 

 object. I was shocked. I drove my spurs into him with 

 redoubled strength, wrenching at the bit at the same time. 

 His head felt like a rock, and only a slight quiver of the 

 muscles answered the spur. I fairly yelled with rage as I 

 struck him over the head with my gun barrel. The blow 

 sounded dull and heavy, but there was no motion, not even of 

 an ear. I never felt so strangely in my life. I was frightened 

 myself. 



At this instant, for all had passed in an instant, just as 

 the Virginian was leveling his pistol for a third shot, our 

 attention was arrested by the quick succession of firing, like 

 a platoon, from the other side of the ridge, followed up by 

 the stunning clamor, which has only to be heard once to be 

 remembered forever, of the Comanche war-whoop ! and then, 

 above us, the heavy tramp and rush of a troop descending the 

 hill directly towards us ! There was no time for deliberation ! 

 "The Indians! take care of yourself, Kentuck !" hastily 



