LANDMARKS 149 



seven years of friendly advances, he came boldly 

 to my cabin and licked salt from my hand. 



The home of the Bighorn is among the moun- 

 tain tops. This one lived on a plateau that was 

 12,000 feet above sea level. Here he spent the 

 winter as well as the summer, but now and then 

 he made an excursion into the lowlands. I no- 

 ticed that he came down for the earliest green grass 

 near my cabin, which was at least three weeks 

 earlier in appearing than the green grass on the 

 plateau up in the sky. Sometimes he came for salt. 

 Generally he came down for some definite thing, 

 but now and then the sheep left the heights with 

 no particular purpose. 



Occasionally I saw where a bear had been am- 

 bling along the brook, and more often I saw where 

 one had been in a ravine only a minute's walk from 

 my cabin. Bears are big, shy people, but they 

 quickly learn of places where they are welcome. 

 They are not savage or ferocious, but harmless, 

 full-of-fun fellows, unless shot at or chased with 

 dogs, and prefer playing to fighting. Early morn- 

 ings I often went out hoping to find one. One morn- 

 ing, while climbing a mountainside near my cabin, 

 I heard the breaking and tearing of rotten logs 

 behind a tree clump, and slipped around to get a 

 glimpse of whatever it was through the spruce 

 woods. 



It was a big, brown grizzly bear. Just the tips 

 of his fur were silvery. He was seated dog-like by 



