THE GUN AT HOME AND ABROAD 
nearly drowned three times and have had other unpleasant adventures, 
such as being chased by a wounded African buffalo and lost for two 
days in a forest, but I think none of them quite come up to the night in 
question. 
We were half frozen before we had got the skin of the bear removed and 
had returned to camp. I was very ill and suffering from bronchitis and it 
took us two hours to get a fire going amongst the rain-soaked timber. 
Albert worked away until he got the heart out of a rotten log that was fairly 
dry and then all was pleasant for a while. About ten o’clock a gale sprang 
up from the east and then the trouble began. About eleven o’clock it turned 
to a raging tempest and the giant spruces first began to crack and then to 
fall. In the course of an hour over 100 trees, about 180 feet high, had 
crashed to the ground close to the camp. We then huddled on the river 
bank overhanging the stream, and had hardly done so when a giant spruce 
fell right across the camp knocking down the tent and scattering the fire. 
Had we been there one of the Indians or I would certainly have been killed. 
As it was, the branches of the fallen tree struck Albert as he dodged out 
of the way, but fortunately without injuring him. Almost immediately 
another tree fell within six yards of us on the other side, and it was only 
by spending the rest of the night facing the bitter blast where it struck the 
bank that we saved our lives. All night long the trees fell in twos and threes 
until, at dawn, what had been a forest was now a jumble of logs. It was, 
indeed, a terrible experience and I was glad to leave the place and race 
down stream when the daylight came. The Indians were absolutely cowed 
and could not speak for hours afterwards. In hunting the grizzly, the 
bear is not always the worst danger a man has to face. The climate of the 
frozen north and its attendant dangers are a worse menace. 
The black bear of North America, Ursus americanus (Pallas), seems to 
change little throughout its known habitat, but is considered by some 
naturalists to alter into other species in Louisiana and Florida. Under 
any circumstances the latter are only sub-species of the common race 
and should be known as Ursus americanus luteolus (Griffith), and Ursus 
americanus floridanus (Merriam). 
The following are recognized by some American naturalists but, with 
the exception of U . emmonsi , they are all varieties of the common black 
bear, which can often be found in a single locality and should not, I 
think, even be recognized as sub-species. 
Ursus americanus (Pallas). The typical form. 
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