AMOS, THE MIGHTY HUNTER 



223 



snow, and I can't git that, and I thinks, 

 if I goes back father'll laugh at me. 

 Jist then the caribou takes a start and 

 I hunts around in the snow and finds 

 the gun, and it was all full of snow. 

 Thinks I, I ain't goin' to let that cari- 

 bou go ! So I hunts up the hatchet, 

 and then I runs down the gulch and 

 gits above the caribou. 1 takes off my 

 snowshoes, and with the tomahawk I 

 jumps right on top of the caribou's 

 back. At the same time the dog takes 

 holt again, and we throw the caribou 

 down and I kills him with the hatchet. 

 Then I went down tu the house feelin' 

 pretty big, and father says, lookin' at 

 me : T sees you got the caribou,' and we 

 went back and skinned it. I had it right 

 handy to the house. Father was a great 

 hunter. You ought'r hear the old man 

 tell about a bear onct. When the old 

 man tells a story he acts it all out, 

 wavin' his arms, jist like the thing hap- 

 pened. 



"Well, he found a bear onct, denned 

 in an old cedar. There was a kind of 

 'spill' on one side of the cedar, where 

 the wood was rotted through, and the 

 tree was hollow, and the bear had gone 

 in there and filled up the hole from the 

 inside. The old man found the den, 

 and he dug the hole away until he 

 could see inside, and at that the bear 

 sticks out his head, and the old man 

 couldn't see jist where he was shootin'. 

 He shoots and he doesn't touch the 

 bear, and when he fired, the dog let 

 into the hole, and it was dog and bear ! 

 The old man laid his gun down along- 

 side a tree, and when the dog hollered 

 he grabbed the dog by the hind legs. 

 You ought to see the old man act that, 

 standin' up and pullin' — he pulled and 

 the bear pulled! By and by the bear 

 lets go to take a fresh holt, and out 

 come the dog, and when he comes he 

 struck against the gun and knocked it 

 into the snow, and it got covered up; 



right after the dog was the bear. The 

 snow was deep, and the old man could- 

 n't find the gun, and they had it ! Him 

 and the dog and the bear ! By and 

 by the old man gits holt of . the 

 ax, and he hits the bear a swipe and 

 kills it. 



"I'd like to have you see a bear we 

 seen last year, and the year before 

 that. I jist seen his track," continued 

 Amos, correcting himself. "The ground 

 was that hard a moose would hardly 

 have made a track ! I tried my boot 

 in the bear's track, sir, and jumpin' T 

 could hardly make a print, but the fel- 

 ler had sunk right into the hard ground 

 as plain as if it had been a light snow." 

 Amos never quivered an eyelash, as 

 he told this story, wi'h an evident air 

 of belief. "Well, I set a trap, and the 

 bear walks right into it. I set it right 

 along where there was a thicket of 

 bushes on the side of the road. Well, 

 sir, he lit out with that trap ! I can't 

 think of no other way than if you'd 

 the strength to fire a barrel of pork. 

 He jist give one big jump, the clog 

 ketched, and he went right on, lea^in' 

 the trap as high as my head In the 

 bushes. Yes, sir ! He went through 

 them bushes jist as if you'd a-fired a 

 barrel of pork. Next spring I set an- 

 other trap and you'd a-thought there 

 was enough chains on it, anyhow. The 

 trap was as much as a man'd want to 

 lug. When I wen I. out to it a rabbit 

 had got into it. The bear had come and 

 walked off with the trap and the rab- 

 bit; then he pulled out the rabbit and 

 left the trap. I don't know where he 

 went, after that. But he was the father- 

 ly big bear. If you could only git a 

 pictur of him ! I will be mightily dis- 

 appointed," said Amos, as his mind 

 turned to a little work he had in hand; 

 "if we don't git some kind of a bear 

 to-morrow ; we ketched eight there last 

 year." 



