A COLORADO BEAR HUNT 69 



the cook, a most competent man, had rigged up a table, 

 and we had folding camp-chairs luxuries utterly un- 

 known to my former camping trips. Each day we break- 

 fasted early and dined ten or twelve hours later, on re- 

 turning from the day's hunt; and as we carried no lunch, 

 the two meals were enjoyed with ravenous pleasure by the 

 entire company. The horses were stout, tough, shaggy 

 beasts, of wonderful staying power, and able to climb like 

 cats. The country was very steep and rugged ; the moun- 

 tain-sides were greasy and slippery from the melting 

 snow, while the snow bucking through the deep drifts on 

 their tops and on the north sides was exhausting. Only 

 sure-footed animals could avoid serious tumbles, and only 

 animals of great endurance could have lasted through 

 the work. Both Johnny Goff and his partner, Brick 

 Wells, who often accompanied us on the hunts, were fre- 

 quently mounted on animals of uncertain temper, with 

 a tendency to buck on insufficient provocation; but they 

 rode them with entire indifference up and down any 

 incline. One of the riders, " Al," a very good tempered 

 man, a tireless worker, had as one of his horses a queer, 

 big-headed dun beast, with a black stripe down its back 

 and traces of zebra-like bands on the backs of his front 

 legs. He was an atavistic animal, looking much as the 

 horses must have looked which an age or two ago lived 

 in this very locality and were preyed on by sabre-toothed 

 tigers, hyenadons, and other strange and terrible beasts 

 of a long-vanished era. Lambert remarked to him: " Al, 

 you ought to call that horse of yours ' Fossil'; he is a 

 hundred thousand years old." To which Al, with im- 



