96 SAVAGE SVANETIA. 



sufficiently soft for tracking, and as above 

 all it was for tliem the only busy part of the 

 year, no one was forthcoming as a guide. 



Xever havmg shot bears in any other part 

 of the world I don't know how people manage 

 elsewhere ; but for the sake of those who have 

 never seen Bruin at home, I may say here 

 that to go promiscuously into a forest where 

 they are even in large numbers is seldom 

 much good. However quiet you may be, old 

 Michael generally manages to hear you ; and 

 big and unwieldy as he looks, a blackbird 

 would make as much noise gettmg away in 

 the thick bush as he would. Though you 

 almost ran into him, unless he was very much 

 startled, the odds are he would sneak off 

 through the rhododendrons, without j^our 

 ever suspecting his presence. In places like 

 the forests on the Black Sea coast, where 

 human bemgs rarely intrude, you may, it is 

 true, catch him making an early breakfast in 



