THE PASSING 
miles below Grant’s Pass, and just out 
of Hell Gate, we crossed the river by 
ferry. Then the road climbed up, up, 
over Taylor mountain, hanging to the 
cafion wall, suspended aé places 1,000 
feet above the river. 
At Galice we left the wagon road, 
the stage station, the telephone, post 
office, camp store and all other evi- 
dences of civilization, and struck the 
manzanita-walled trail for the deeper 
mountain wilds. We made camp the 
first night on Rogue river, a few miles 
below Galice; had a supper of quai! 
and rainbow trout; a long, peaceful 
chat and smoke while we sat on our 
unrolled blankets and surveyed the 
wide world around us; then turned in 
and slept the deep sleep of the man of 
the outer world. 
We were on the trail again by seven 
next morning. It was yet dark; for 
the November days are short. But 
soon the sun peeped over the saw-tooth 
ranges and melted the frost on the 
undergrowth. All day we clambered 
and climbed. The trail dimmed out 
and we followed the ridges. Every 
hour took us deeper into the primeval. 
Most of the time we threshed the under- 
growth and threaded our way between 
the giant trees, under the impenetrable 
canopy of the forest. Only now and 
then we emerged upon an open. 
On the third day we traveled higher. 
There was a deeper tang of the cedar 
and balsam fir in the air, and a sharper 
spice of the early winter frost. 
By mid-afternoon of the third day 
we reached our journey’s end, a trap- 
per’s shanty in the heart of Bear Camp. 
We were now at an elevation of 6,000 
feet. The heavy timber gave way to 
sparse hemlocks and stunted pines, with 
an undergrowth of cinnamon and sweet 
acorn. ‘The atmosphere was bright and 
crisp. We were fifty miles from any 
highway wider than a pack trail, and, 
according to Billy the trapper’s most 
conservative calculation, we were “‘sev- 
enty-five miles from a keg of beer by 
the shortest route.” 
Billy gave us the big warm hand of 
OF REEL-PAW 590 
the man of the mountains, and though 
we had never met him before, we were 
acquainted with him in five minutes, 
and he made us at home in less time 
than that. He insisted that we camp 
with him. We accepted, piled our 
traps in a corner, hobbled the cayuses, 
and sat down to a royal supper of roast 
venison, broiled bear steak and Dutch 
oven biscuits. 
After the meal was done, and the tin 
dishes doused and swabbed, we sat on 
the shanty door-step and smoked and 
talked. Rather, Dan and I smoked and 
listened while Billy told tales of his ex- 
periences as trapper, hunter, guide, 
prospector and Indian fighter. We 
knew that Billy was old, very old, but 
we were staggered when he told us 
that a man died young unless he lived 
to be ninety. When we asked how old 
he was, he spoke up quick and sharp :— 
“Old? Do you think I’m old? I’m 
only ninety-five.” 
Then we understood how the old 
trapper could tell of things that hap- 
pened in the “fall of *49,” the “spring 
of ’52,” or “the bad winter of ’56,” as 
readily and easily as we could recall 
occurrences of last week. 
“Venison and bear meat, plenty of 
open air, plenty of work and plenty of 
sleep have done it,” said the old moun- 
taineer. “If everybody quit pork and 
beef and ate deer meat, slept out of 
doors and close to the ground, they 
would all live ninety or a hundred years 
instead of sixty or seventy.” 
And from this topic Billy switched 
to bears in general, and then bears in 
particular, by which we came by the 
knowledge of *Reel-Paw, the great 
black bear of the Coast mountains. 
Reel-Paw was the terror of every 
rancher in southern Oregon. For years 
he had defied man, gun and dogs. His 
original home was the limestone caves 
of Greyback, but he ranged all the way 
*In the earlier days of his notorious career, this 
big black bear was caught in a trap, which he 
dragged away with him, finally escaping from it, 
but not till he had broken and badly maimed his 
foot. This caused the deformity that later gave him 
the name, ‘‘Reel-Paw,’”’ which, in Western trappers’ 
parlance, means ‘‘Club-Foot.”’ 
