X 
THE BEAR 
369 
grass. I made a most satisfactory shot with the 
•577 at 150 yards, the bullet passing through 
the kidneys, and the bear rolled over and over 
the whole way down the steep grassy hill, 
until stopped by the thick bushes, which alone 
prevented it from rolling into the streamlet at the 
bottom. 
My two men came galloping up, and shortly 
dismounted, and we all descended to the place 
where the bear was lying, almost dead. In fact, it 
died while we were standing over it. 
“ Well done ; that was a fine shot, and weVe got 
the grizzly bear at last,” exclaimed Jem Bourne. 
“ The bear? This is not the bear that Big Bill ran 
from,” I replied; “ impossible, this is a silver-tip, 
and not a true grizzly.” The argument that ensued 
over the carcase of that bear was quite enough to 
make me an unbeliever in the ordinary accounts of 
native hunters. I calculated that the body weighed 
about 600 lbs., as my two men were 6 feet high, 
and exceedingly powerful, and our united efforts 
could not move the bear one inch from the spot 
where it had fallen; it may have exceeded that 
weight, as it was full of fat, and in the finest 
condition. We skinned it, and had some trouble to 
induce the horse to permit the hide to be lashed 
upon its back. Although a fine bear. Big Bill on 
our return would not acknowledge that it could be 
compared with the monster which he had seen with 
such “a smiling countenance.” I was quite of his 
opinion, as the tracks which I saw in the snow were 
VOL. I 
2 B 
