136 



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at first, but thinking that they were a band of Indians 

 coming with this ceremony to trade (which is not uncom- 

 mon) we did not fire upon them till the balls and arrows 

 came whistling about our heads ; then only was the word 

 given, • Fire ! ' Had they been bold enough at the onset 

 to have rushed into the fort, we could have done nothing 

 but suffer death under their tomahawks." 



Mr. Denig gave me the following " Bear Story," as he 

 heard it from the parties concerned: " In the year 1835 

 two men set out from a trading-post at the head of the 

 Cheyenne, and in the neighborhood of the Black Hills, to 

 trap Beaver; their names were Michel Carri^re and Bernard 

 Le Brun. Carriere was a man about seventy years old, 

 and had passed most of his life in the Indian country, in 

 this dangerous occupation of trapping. One evening as 

 they were setting their traps along the banks of a stream 

 tributary to the Cheyenne, somewhat wooded by bushes 

 and Cottonwood trees, their ears were suddenly saluted 

 by a growl, and in a moment a large she Bear rushed upon 

 them. Le Brun, being a young and active man, imme- 

 diately picked up his gun, and shot the Bear through the 

 bowels. Carriere also fired, but missed. The Bear then 

 pursued them, but as they ran for their lives, their legs did 

 them good service ; they escaped through the bushes, and 

 the Bear lost sight of them. They had concluded the 

 Bear had given up the chase, and were again engaged in 

 setting their traps, when Carriere, who was a short distance 

 from Le Brun, went through a small thicket with a trap 

 and came directly in front of the huge, wounded beast, 

 which, with one spring, bounded upon him and tore him in 

 an awful manner. With one stroke of the paw on his face 

 and forehead he cut his nose in two, and one of the claws 

 reached inward nearly to the brain at the root of the nose ; 

 the same stroke tore out his right eye and most of the 

 flesh from that side of his face. His arm and side were 

 literally torn to pieces, and the Bear, after handling him in 



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