164 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
March 2, 1895. 
no mast where they are at the "close fof summer, they 
leave that section and travel till they locate the mast. A 
good bear hunter puts no dependence on what he hears 
about plenty of bear in the summer, for he knows that in 
the fall they may all have moved out and be a hundred 
miles from there. 
' 'When the nuts get ripe in the fall the bear climbs the 
trees for them. They pull in the branches of the trees 
with their paws, and you can hear the limbs breaking 
and popping at a great rate. We say the bear are 'lap- 
ping' at that time, I suppose because they go up into the 
laps, or forks of the trees while feeding. 
- "Early this year we had a heavy freeze all over north- 
ern Mississippi, and this killed down the mast over a 
good deal of the country, and I know the bear have 
moved out very largely. A good bear hunter, when he 
goes out to hunt, does not just go into the woods hit or 
miss. He studies the feed, and knowing the habits of 
the game, he moves around until he 'locates the mast.' 
Now, if I had known you were coming down here for a 
hunt a couple of weeks before you came, I'd have known 
by this time right where the big body of the bear were 
feeding. The first thing I'd have done wotdd be to find 
how far south this freeze went. Then I'd have gone 
down there and hunted up the watering places, and 
studied its feed and looked up the sign. Then I'd have 
been ready to go right where the game was at once. 
"1^ am not exaggerating when I tell you that right 
BROILED DOG. ! 
We had a pleasant time about the vast camp fire that 
night, and I recall one incident that will serve sufficiently 
well to illustrate the headlong and impetuous character of 
our hunt and hunter in chief. The camp was full of 
dogs, and it was a good deal of a task to get enough corn 
bread cooked for them all. They swarmed around under- 
foot, and whenever one dog jostled against another there 
was a fight at once. Every dog of the pack was a good, 
cheerful fighter, and didn't need a second invitation to 
pitch in. They would fight anywhere they happened to be, 
and they were usually between somebody's legs or under 
someone's feet. There were no stoves in the shanties, 
and our fire, a great affair built of long hardwood slabs, 
was built between two of the houses which stood end to 
end. The dogs were all around the fire, under the horses, 
and continually getting under foot. It seemed etiquette 
to stop a fight with a club. At length one particularly 
quarrelsome hound started a good lively fight with an- 
other dog right at Mr. Bono's feet. He made a good 
free kick at the growling, biting aggregate, and hap- 
pening to catch the hound just right, lifted him clear off 
the ground and sent him back downward right in the 
middle of the big log fire! Happily, the fire was not blaz- 
ing, and the dog lit on a piece of log. Here he lay for a 
moment, wriggling to turn over, with a foul smell of 
singed hair arising, until finally he made a spring and got 
off. Running under the house, at once every dog under 
ON THE TRAIL. 
Welcome back to the Ranch- With a Load of Meat. 
where we will hunt we could kill bear like frogs if the 
mast was good. It is not good, but the bear have not all 
left, of course, and even if they were moving out we 
would hit some traveler's trail. Don't you be uneasy, 
we'll get our bear to-morrow. And I'll show you the 
wildest country you ever saw." 
THE WILDEST COUNTRY IN THE UNITED STATES. 
As to the accuracy of the latt6r statement there is no 
doubt. By mere chance I had blundered into what I 
now believe to be the wildest, most impenetrable piece of 
country in the United States and the best hunting 
country for bear, deer, turkey and fur. We hear all 
about the Rockies, and I read about the Adirondacks and 
other such well known regions till I get sick of it. Once 
in a while, too, we hear in a vague way about the hunt- 
ing of the South, and it is understood there are still deer 
and a few bear there. But that there should exist so 
wide a strip of country so wild and so abounding with 
big game, I had never had any idea on earth, nor do I 
believe that many northern men have known of it. It 
was the Forest and Stream luck that led me to it. As it 
is certain that a great many others will now want to go 
there, and as it is also certain that most of these cannot 
go there, and could not do any successful hunting if 
they did go there, I beg patience while I try to describe, 
slowly and carefully, the conditions of the country and 
the necessities for sport there. This will best appear 
from the plain description of our own hunt, which was 
succesful. 
AT THE TIMBER CAMP. 
It was dusk when we reached the Bobo timber camp, 
on the banks of the Sunflower, about twenty miles from 
the plantation. Here we found three shacks, or cabins, 
made of upright shakes, two used for sleeping rooms 
and one for a kitchen. All about the woods and the 
dense cane brakes shut in close. The only road was the 
logging trail, a roll-way down to the river being estab- 
lished just back of the houses. We found Fitcber Bobo, 
Mr. Bobo's oldest son, in charge here of the gang of log- 
gers and rafters. The foreman's name was Heide. 
It was an ideal camp for a hunter as well as a timber- 
man, this rough spot in the heart of the big wilderness, 
and indeed it looked a hunter's camp. Two or three hides 
of bear were tacked out on the walls of the shanties. 
Heide brought us the skin of a panther not long killed; a 
large one, measuring eight feet nine inches. He also ex- 
hibited with pride a great bear skin, kdled by himself not 
long ago as he was walking out along the road after deer. 
The bear came out of the cane, and he killed it stone dead 
with a charge of buckshot. It was lean and the coat 
was thin. 
Mr.. Bobo made inquiries among the camp boys about 
bear sign, and I was glad to hear one of them tell of 
tracks latety seen at a water hole a couple of miles away. 
Mr. Bobo had not been down in this country before that 
fall, and proceeded to learn all possible about the water in 
such and such bayous, etc., points of interest for the hunt 
that was to follow. 
"Well, maybe they never heard one holler," said he, 
"and so they thought no one else ever did. They do, 
just the same. Then' call is a sort of scream. No, I 
shouldn't say it was like a woman's scream. I have 
heard them give a sort of coarse, rumbling purr or whine, 
like a big cat, too. The panther that followed us was 
crying out every once in a while. It sometimes came up 
within a few feet of us in the dark. I think a good willow 
switch would do to scare away about any panther in the 
country." 
Meantime the New Orleans express was speeding south- 
ward. I had quite forgotten it. 
909 Security Building, Chicago, 111. E. Hough. 
there jumped on to him and licked him because his singed 
hair didn't smell good, and for a few moments we had 
the biggest and most universal and loudest dog fight I 
ever heard or witnessed Meantime Mr. Bobo continued 
his story, not changing a muscle of his face. The dog was 
not hurt much, but I did not envy him his lot. To be 
kicked about in two, roasted alive, and then jumped on 
by your neighbors is what you might call hard luck, 
especially when it all happens in less than fifteen seconds, 
and right when you're not expecting It. 
STORIES. 
Mi 1 . Bobo told us plenty of bear stories, as you may sup- 
pose, and I wish I had time for some of them. 
"It is a mistake to think that the black bear of this 
country is a small and timid animal," said he. "They 
will run from a man or from the dogs just as every kind 
of bear usually will, but they don't seem much afraid to 
stop and fight the dogs when they feel so disposed. A 
bear won't leave his bed till the clogs get right on to him. 
If he's fat, he will climb a tree or sit up by a tree and fight, 
rather than run. If he gets hold of a dog he will bite his 
whole head in. Of course, the best bear dog is one that 
won't fight too close. 
"I have had two or three bear come at me, one an old 
she bear which I shot almost up against me. I have 
killed many a bear with a pistol, and many with just my 
knife when the pack had them bayed so I could get at 
them close. Of course, it's all in the dogs. You rarely 
ever shoot a bear over fifteen or twenty yards at the out- 
side. If you hit it anywhere in the hollow of the body 
back of its fore legs, the dogs will get it sure. Of course, 
wounded bear might come for a fellow oftener, but you 
see we always have the dogs there, so the danger is 
small. The shooting of the bear is the last part of the 
whole business. We all carry the light carbine model 
Winchester, 44-40 or 38-40, as that is the handiest gun to 
ride cane with. We are so close when we shoot that we 
usually hit the bear about right to kill him the first shot. 
It sometimes happens that a dog is hit by a bullet that 
has gone through a bear. I have had dogs killed that way. 
"As to the size of bears in this country, I have killed 
them to weigh 700 pounds dressed. That was a fat bear. 
A weight of 300 or 400 is common, I may say. 
"I consider the wild hog the most dangerous animal to 
meet in these woods. They will charge anything. All 
the other animals will run. 
"There are some wolves'in these bottoms. I once had 
a man out with me once who was treed, or rather chased 
up on a log, by a pack of wolves. He broke his gun stock 
off hitting them, but he killed several before we got at 
him. 
"There are a good many panthers in these woods, "but 
I never really knew of one attacking a man. One fol- 
lowed another man and me one night for over six miles. 
We had to swim our horses over a bayou at one place, 
and it left us there. " 
I asked Mr. Bobo the old Forest and Stream question 
whether or not the panther screamed, telling that some 
wise men had said it never did. 
FLORIDA FUN. -III. 
The day after the boys started home was bright, with 
a bracing northwest wind, so after an early dinner H 
and Joe started for an old field three miles south from 
town, where a man said there were two coveys that had 
never been disturbed. 
Arrived at the field, they canvassed it and the ad- 
jacent ground for two hours, without finding the least 
sign of quail, and at last, filled with disgust, reviling liars 
in general and Florida quail liars in particular, they 
started homeward, but when about half-way back to 
town, turned into a weed-grown pear orchard. They had 
found some in there, a week before, and the way Joe 
went to work showed that he was determined to find 
them again. He finally disappeared in the weeds, and 
did not come when called, so H started to hunt the 
dog, expecting to find him on a point, but happening to 
look toward the woods, he saw the dog sixty rods away, 
in full chase of something which could not be seen for 
the bushes, but which Joe soon ran up a big pine. H - 
was not in a very good humor before this happened, and 
noiv he was glad of a chance to take it out of Joe's hide, 
so he cut a good switch and started for the dog. Joe 
knew what was coming, and meekly started to meet his 
expected thrashing; but his big, brown eyes flashed so 
eloquently to be let off easily that H only whipped 
him a little, and then sent him back into the weeds. In 
a few minutes he found the trail of a running covey, 
which he followed several hundred yards before they 
stopper!. They wound around through the weeds, and 
rrossed their trail several times. It was nearly sundown, 
iind they were very much opposed to flight, and conse- 
quent scattering so near roosting time, but it was useless. 
Joe held to the trail as surely as if they had been leading 
him by a siring, and at last they were driven into a cor- 
ner and had to" fly. H was very desirous of marking 
them down exactly, so decided to take but one shot as 
they rose. Selecting the extreme right-hand one, the, 
shot left a cloud of feathers in the air and a very dead 
bird fell in the weeds. H watched their flight 
through the open pine woods, then saw them swerve to 
the right and drop at the edge of a little swamp. "All 
right, Joe, they are right on a line between the up-turned 
root and that magnolia-tree in the swamp. Now, we will 
go down there, and you will find them, and I'll undertake 
to kill every one you find." Joe had kept his eye on the 
spot where the dead bird fell, and did not look away from 
it now, but wagged his tail to say that he heard. Then 
he brought the dead one, and they started for the others, 
both man and dog fully determined to wipe that bunch of 
quail from off the face of the earth. Fifteen feet from 
the edge of the bushes Joe pointed. It did not fly twenty 
feet before it was knocked into pulp. It was not the 
way to get nice meat, but it would have been out of 
sight if it got ten feet farther, and H 's blood was up, 
determined to kill every one of those birds. Another got 
up and tried to get back to the field, but dropped in the 
grass thirty yards away, leaving a lot of floating feath- 
ers, drifting slowly to the ground. Joe accidentally 
flushed the third one in the edge of the swamp. H 
made a clean miss with the first, and tried to get it with 
the second just as it disappeared in the tall, thick bushes, 
and got a lot of feathers, but did not see whether it fell, 
and Joe failed to find it. He came back and pointed an- 
other one, which topped the bushes, and went straight 
away, and H made one of those unaccountable and 
aggravating misses that fall to the lot of every sportsman. 
Then H sat down on a log, and gave himself a talk- 
ing to. 
"Now look here, old man. You said you were going to 
i 
kill every one of those birds, and you've let two get awa L 
out of five. It's plain that you are rattled. You saw the 
bushes when you tried to kill those lost two birds. Now 
mind, you don't see any more bushes when you try to 
shoot. Just see the bird, and nothing else, do you hear? 
Joe is on a point now, but you just take out your watch 
and see that three minutes pass before you get up from 
this log." 
When the three minutes were up, H walked leis-< 
urely toward the dog. The bird got up twenty feet away, 
and flew back over H 's head. He threw up his gun,,! 
and was about to shoot before it passed over him, but 
said: "Steady, old man!" turned and watched the bird; 
till his eye had correctly located the bird and the direc- 
tion of its flight, then threw the gun to his shoulder and , 
following the flight of the bird for an instant, pulled the 
trigger and made a clean kill, the bird falling inside of 
thirty yards. Whereupon he shook hands with himself, i 
but with a caution not to get rattled again. 
The next one found did not have to go twenty feet to 
get out of sight, but a charge of shot literally split it wide 
open. There was nothing left of it but two wings, held 
together by shreds of the breast. Then Joe found the 
trail of one that had run and followed it to a point, a rod j 
from the edge of the bushes. H did not want to shoot 
the birds all to pieces, so decided he would get between | 
this one and the swamp and take his chance on killing it,] 
if it flew over his head as he expected it would, but it 
circled to the right expecting to enter the bushes thirty I 
yards below. "You've got lots of time," said H to] 
himself, and then dropped the bird just at the edge of the 1 
bushes. While he stood waiting for Joe to find some 
more, one flushed from almost under his feet, and by so 
doing made a fatal mistake. Then Joe was made to hunt 
the ground all over again very closely, but it was ten" 
minutes before another one was found and added to the 
bag. Judging that this was about the last of them, H- 
started to get up to the one he had missed, and marked. 
Joe found its trail in thick grass, followed it some dis- 
tance and pointed, but before H got there it flushed. 
