IN THE LOUISIANA CANEBRAKES 367 



lad who has ceased being a child. The two Metcalfs 

 and Holt understood one another thoroughly, and under- 

 stood their hounds and the game their hounds followed 

 almost as thoroughly. 



They had killed many deer and wildcat, and now and 

 then a panther; but their favorite game was the black 

 bear, which, until within a very few years, was extraordi- 

 narily plentiful in the swamps and canebrakes on both 

 sides of the lower Mississippi, and which is still found 

 here and there, although in greatly diminished numbers. 

 In Louisiana and Mississippi the bears go into their dens 

 toward the end of January, usually in hollow trees, often 

 very high up in living trees, but often also in great logs 

 that lie rotting on the ground. They come forth toward 

 the end of April, the cubs having been born in the inter- 

 val. At this time the bears are nearly as fat, so my in- 

 formants said, as when they enter their dens in January; 

 but they lose their fat very rapidly. On first coming out 

 in the spring they usually eat ash buds and the tender 

 young cane called mutton cane, and at that season they 

 generally refuse to eat the acorns even when they are 

 plentiful. According to my informants it is at this sea- 

 son that they are most apt to take to killing stock, almost 

 always the hogs which run wild or semi-wild in the 

 woods. They are very individual in their habits, how- 

 ever; many of them never touch stock, while others, usu- 

 ally old he-bears, may kill numbers of hogs; in one case 

 an old he-bear began this hog-killing just as soon as he 

 left his den. In the summer months they find but little 

 to eat, and it is at this season that they are most industrious 



