A DISAPPOINTMENT. 317 



Just as I was thinking of closing up for the night, my 

 companion shouted to me that there was a bear in the 

 water. On looking up stream, sure enough Bruin was in 

 sight, stemming the current and boldly pushing for this 

 side. With hasty impulse I laid my rod down to grasp 

 my rifle, but, alas ! my attendant, fatigued with carrying it, 

 and seeing small prospect of its being required, had left 

 it leaning against a rock some distance off. You may well 

 imagine my disappointment, for when the bear left the wa- 

 ter he was not over twenty-five yards above my position. 

 This animal, judging from his size, must have been quite 

 four hundred pounds a size much greater than it general- 

 ly attains in the north-west. Until he had firmly gained 

 his footing he had not observed us, and the ludicrousness 

 of his alarm and astonishment when he became aware of 

 our vicinity was laughable in the extreme. Off he went 

 with a rush into the brush, making dry and withered limbs 

 crash before him. 



As the constant and severe attention of the flies put fish- 

 ing out of the question, and I had become surfeited with 

 tobacco from the number of cigars I had consumed, under 

 the fallacy that the smoke would deprive me of their com- 

 pany, I was compelled, as a last resource, to start on a tour 

 of inspection, at the same time hoping that my exertions 

 would be rewarded with the discovery of some quadruped 

 or bird with which I had been previously unacquainted. 

 On entering the scrub-bush the mosquitoes became more 

 numerous, and I have little hesitation in saying that the 

 blood-suckers of Arkansas and Mississippi, which bear the 

 same name, are far from proficients when you compare 

 them with those of Labrador. After half an hour's rough 

 scrambling through the morass, I succeeded in gaining 

 more open ground. Rising townrd the upper ridges of 

 high lands, the squaw-berry and blue-berry grew in profu- 



