1 62 The Grizzly Bear 



went over backward with an astonished bawl, and when 

 he regained his feet, he was tail toward me and kept this 

 position as long as I could see him. The first jump he 

 made landed him head on against a dry-goods box; at the 

 next he smashed into a tree; but he finally got his bearings 

 and made off, if anything, faster than he had come at me. 



When I had got my bearings, I looked around for 

 my hat, but, being unable to find it in the half light, de- 

 cided to hunt it up in the morning. I was not, at the 

 moment, conscious of very great excitement, but when I 

 reached camp I found that my hands were trembling 

 rather uncomfortably, and it was several days before I 

 recovered my usual absence of nerves. The next day, 

 when I rescued my hat, I found, two holes in the soft brim 

 through which the bear had driven his claws, and one 

 corner of my iron battery case was broken open like a 

 ship's bow after a collision. 



I am quite satisfied that had I made any noise as I 

 approached the place where the bears had been feeding, 

 they would have retreated before I reached them; but the 

 ground was soft and my steps were noiseless. And, hun- 

 gry as they doubtless were, one of them resented my 

 sudden interruption of their feast. 



Altogether I did not find the grizzlies of Yellowstone 

 Park in any degree more tame or less cunning than they 

 are to-day, for example, in the Selkirks. Many of them, 

 it is true, come to the garbage piles to feed, but these very 

 bears, fifty yards back in the timber, are again as wild as 

 any of them anywhere. I was both surprised and inter- 

 ested by this, and, after watching them carefully from the 

 positions provided for the public, I repeatedly concealed 



