199 
May, 1922 
I 
for quite a distance. But I didn’t see a 
irop of blood so I gave it up and sat 
down on a rock to rest. 
In a few minutes I heard something of¥ 
,:o my right and after waiting and won- 
iering what it was I suddenly saw a 
ipig black bear within forty steps of me, 
jrunting along like an old black hog. He 
was entirely unaware of my presence, so 
•aising my gun and catching a bead be- 
lind his shoulders I pulled the trigger. 
llBe did not fall nor even stop to bite at 
ulie place where the bullet had hit him, 
mt whirled squarely around and started 
0 go right away from me. This gave me 
. quartering shot and I put another bul- 
et in him. This time he stopped and bit 
fit the wound and this gave me a chance 
jo get in another shot. By that time he 
vas at the edge of the rim rock and over 
jfe went out of sight. 
I ran as fast as I could to where I 
ould see down the hill and by that time 
e had got nearly a hundred and fifty 
ards down the hill. I saw him stop and 
pulled down and shot right on the top 
f his back and he rolled over on his 
ack with all four feet sticking straight 
p in the air. I watched him a minute 
r two and then I started on down. As 
3on as I got over the rim rock I couldn’t 
• ee him any more. So when I got within 
orty or fifty yards I sheered off to the 
fight so a«s to keep above him, as I 
jidn’t propose to take any chances. 
1 I edged along pretty cautiously now 
ntil I could see the place where he lay 
hd, lo and behold, he was gone. This 
'as a little disconcerting, as tracking a 
ounded bear is not always pleasant 
ork ; so I kept upon the rim rock and 
loved along the hill very carefully with 
jiy gun in position to shoot instantly. 
*^retty soon I saw him not over twenty 
eps below me. He had crawled into a 
ump of bushes and was lying there 
erfectly still. 
' I picked up a good-sized rock and 
urled it down that way. It lit right on 
)p of him. He tried to raise himself up 
nd in struggling around exposed his 
ead. I caught a bead at the butt of the 
ar and fired. This ended his career. 
Vhen he went over this time he went to 
;ay. I waited a while to be sure, then 
went down to where he was and found 
lat he was a fine, black fellow, and fat, 
) 0 . 
I dressed him and started back to 
amp. On the way I ran across Frank 
nd he told me he had killed the biggest 
Lick that he had ever seen and had found 
' here the bear were rising in a large 
; atch of huckleberries. This was the 
' i'-rst day we had found bear signs, so I 
Aid him we would bring the dogs in the 
lorning and surprise the bear. He could 
! ardly believe me when I told him that 
i had killed a big one. 
We had left the dogs in camp up to 
lis time, but now it was evident that 
leir time had come to take a hand in 
le hunt and they were eager for the 
ray, or at least the reader would have 
fought so if he could have seen them 
erform when I got back to camp and 
hey had smelled the blood of the bear 
n me. 
FOREST AND STREAM 
T he next morning w’e took the horses 
with us as far as the deer I had hung 
up and then we went on up towards 
where Frank had found the bear sign. 
We followed along up a ridge that led 
off up between two creeks and had not 
gone far when upon looking across to the 
opposite side of the creek on our right. 
He sat on a limb about twenty feet 
from the ground 
we saw a big brown bear, standing per- 
fectly still and looking at us. This was 
an unusual thing for a bear to do but 
we did not stop to take time to find out 
the reason but both guns came into posi- 
tion and two bullets went zizing over in 
that direction a whole lot quicker than 
it takes to tell it. One at least found its 
mark, for he reared back and rolled over 
and was out of sight before we could 
shoot again. 
I had an idea he would work along 
down toward the creek, which was only 
a small stream, and I sent the dogs after 
him. They went down that hill like a 
cyclone and it was only a few minutes 
before they came in contact with him. 
As the fight raged we made our way 
down towards them and cut in below so 
we could see across on the opposite side. 
We took up a good position alongside 
of a big log and waited. 
Nearer and nearer they came, fighting 
every foot of the way, and in a short 
time came into view. The bear was 
badly hurt, we could see that, as the 
dogs were having it all their own way. 
When he got to the creek he just dropped 
right down in a hole of water and there 
he lay, too near gone to make any re- 
sistance to amount to anything, although 
the dogs were yanking at him all the 
time. We shot him in the head to end 
it quickly, as we did not want him to 
suffer any longer than we could help. 
The first shots had both taken effect 
and he would have died from them be- 
fore long. We still had lots of time, as 
it was early and we had not even reached 
the huckleberry patch yet, so we went 
on and when we got to the patch the 
dogs struck another fresh track and 
away they went. Down across the Right 
Fork of Smith River and over a ridge 
and out of hearing in a very few min- 
utes. We didn’t like this much, as we 
were getting up into a pretty tough 
country where we couldn't take our 
horses, but we followed and when we 
got onto the ridge we still couldn't hear 
them and were undecided what to do, as 
there was a chance that they would go 
over on the Rough and Ready side. So 
we sat down and talked the matter over 
for a while and had just about made up 
our minds to go up to the top of the 
divide when we heard them again away 
off up the main prong of Smith River 
and coming back. We could tell that 
they had not overtaken him yet, as they 
were coming swiftly and opening every 
j ump. 
We started straight down the ridge 
that we were on in hopes of getting 
sight of him as there were lots of open 
places down that way, but we were too 
late. Fie must have had a big start on 
the dogs for they kept coming at a 
furious rate and in a few minutes they 
passed in below us and went on down to- 
wards where I had killed the bear the 
day before. We took down around the 
sidehill now and cross cut the gulches 
and kept pretty high up for we weren't 
sure that he wouldn't make another 
turn. But in a few minutes we had the 
satisfaction of hearing the dogs com- 
mence to bark up a tree and we knew 
the chase was ended. We found him up 
a good-sized pine tree, but he had only 
gone up about twenty feet above the 
ground. It was an easy matter to roll 
him out of there, which we did without 
much ceremony. I shot him in the head 
and Frank gave him one in the body. 
^\’e had more now than we could pack 
in at one trip so we hiked out for the 
horses and went and got Frank’s big 
buck, and he zvas a big one, too. We 
took him home whole and he weighed 
one hundred and eighty pounds, dressed. 
One ham alone, cut off at the joint, 
weighed thirty-six pounds. We got the 
bear I had killed the day before and 
the forked-horn buck and went to camp, 
leaving the two big bear to be packed in 
the next day. We now had six bucks 
and three bear, so I told Frank I thought 
we had better go the next morning as 
early as we could and get the other two 
bear in and get the whole outfit to the 
wagon as soon as possible, so we could 
skin them, cut them up, salt them, and 
put them in the boxes we had brought 
along. 
V^E were careful to not take the dogs 
along the next morning for if we 
kept taking the dogs it was pretty nearly 
a sure shot we would have to lay over 
still longer. Our wagon was on Di- 
mond Creek and when we got there wc 
cut all the meat up and salted it except 
{Continued on page 232) 
