120 GOLOV1NSKY. 



hazels high above me. The creature looked as if 

 it was browsing, and might have been anything 

 from a cow to a rhinoceros, for any distinguishing 

 feature that I could discern. However, in such a 

 position, I argued, it must be game of some sort, 

 so, raising my rifle, I aimed as nearly as possible 

 into the middle of it, and fired. The yells that 

 followed my shot were proof positive that I had hit 

 something, and before I had time to turn, an old 

 bear was coming straight down to me through the 

 brushwood, ' puffing ' furiously as he came, like 

 an excited locomotive engine. I had time to notice 

 that his mode of progression was curious and lop- 

 sided, lurching as he did on to his hams at every 

 step, and when he was almost on top of me, rolling 

 over the cutting in which I stood : only avoiding 

 me by a few yards, he went crashing downhill, 

 taking another bullet with him as he went, and 

 lodging under a fallen tree far down the hillside. 



Here for a time I left him, making the woods 

 hideous with his snarling and moaning ; and after 

 some ten minutes' shouting I managed to get my 

 guide, Stepan, to come to me, white and shaking 

 with fright. He explained to me that he thought 

 I had been certainly killed, and in consequence of 

 this, I suppose, believed 1 should want his services 

 no more. Standing in the cutting, I pointed out 

 to him the place where Bruin lay, far down through 

 an almost impenetrable thicket of blackberry-bush 



