Forest and Stream 
Vol. LXXXIII. September 19, 1914 No. 12 
The Old Timer Talks of Cats, Catamounts and Bears 
A Discussion as to the Actual Ferocity of Wild Animals 
How dangerous are the so-called dangerous 
animals? How savage are the savage? How 
much is to be feared from the sneaking, sharp- 
clawed denizens of the wild, or from the shaggy- 
coated, flat-footed berry and salmon eaters of 
the forests? Will a mountain lion or any of 
his cat-like tribe waylay man? Are black or 
brown bears dangerous to a belated hunter or a 
woods-wandering child? 
The writer has met them all and his knowledge 
shows them much more afraid of man than 
man should be of them. 
Wolves when running in packs over snow 
drifted ground, driven by hunger will take great 
chances to fill their empty stomachs, sometimes 
even going so far as to attack one of the human 
race, but, as with all other habitats of the wild, 
much more than the truth is told concerning 
them, and cowards at heart, they, even when in 
a famished state, are a lot less harmful than 
romancers would have us believe. 
Good evidence of this comes from the fact 
that six large grey timber wolves, as shown by 
their tracks, in the dusk of a stormy November 
afternoon, trailed the writer four or five miles 
through woods and brush, without once being 
seen, or daring to attack him, and years later, 
in the wilds of the Olympics, four followed his 
14 -year-old son for more than an hour, almost 
to the door of the tent without the boy know¬ 
ing it until he saw their footprints next morn¬ 
ing. 
Tread on the corns of a big brown bear and 
if he cannot get away, he will repay such at¬ 
tention with a hug or a blow. But in a bravery 
contest between a cougar, a black bear and a 
Jack rabbit, there would be no choice and really 
my own opinion is that either of the first two 
would run on less provocation than the rabbit, 
go further and step off just as quickly. 
A single rat often has more courage than a 
forest full of cats, catamounts and bears. At 
least so the writer believes, but his knowledge 
of rats was mostly gained in one sharply de¬ 
fined incident, an event however, which showed 
them to have much less fear of man than the 
larger animals. 
The rats in question were unbidden guests of 
a large marble-fronted, marble-trimmed hotel in 
a good sized Western City. 
A deluge of rain, almost a cloud-burst, filled 
every sewer to overflowing and the army of 
rodents inhabiting them climbed into the house 
drains for shelter. They followed an oak-cased 
pipe up into this hotel, leaving it wherever an 
opening showed large enough for one to squeeze 
through. 
In the room occupied by the writer there was 
a very considerable break in the casing and while 
By Edward T. Martin. 
he slept, the visiting rats found it. They played 
tag around the floor, ran over the bed with their 
muddy feet and at last one, more venturesome 
than his companions, sat up on the sleeper’s face 
and commenced scratching for fleas, or some 
such abominable trick. That woke the writer 
with a jump. He tried to figure if it was a 
dream, this thing sitting on his face, and con¬ 
cluded it was, so he settled down and curled 
up for another snooze when two squealing rats 
ran over his feet. He knew then it was fact, 
not fancy that confronted him, and turned on the 
lights. 
There were some twenty of the rodents in his 
room, and the light didn’t frighten them back 
into their hole either. They wouldn’t even move 
away when the writer arose to ring for the bell 
The Old Fellow Seemed to Find Something on 
His Mind. 
boy but glared at him with beady eyes and 
snapped at his bare feet as he passed. 
When boys and porter came, they faced them, 
fought and showed greater courage and less 
fear of man than any cougar, bear, or wolf 
the writer ever saw. 
Only a few years ago, the Olympics sheltered 
very many cougars and they were so shy, so 
afraid of their human enemies, it seems un¬ 
likely their numbers have decreased since. 
The writer and his party in different trips, 
covering in all a hundred days, hunted them 
persistently and failed to get but one, really 
didn’t get that for an outsider killed it. There 
were places full of their signs, rocks where 
they sunned themselves, springs around which 
the earth was packed almost solid by their feet, 
made when coming to water; yet they would 
run like a deer at the approach of man and 
were hardly ever seen. The one shot jumped 
from a tree, on the back of a young calf and 
killed it. He must have been very hungry for 
when the mother cow came to the relief of her 
offspring, he fought for his dinner and with a 
downward swipe of his sharp claws laid her 
shoulder open. This though, was his undoing 
for her bellowings brought man to the rescue- 
more properly two men, although one with a 
fish rod hardly counted. 
Fresh veal is good to eat for beast as well 
as man. A dog would fight for the shin bone 
of a calf, a cat spit and growl over the threat¬ 
ened loss of a few scraps, but this sneaking 
killer of fawns, when he heard man coming, 
skulked away with hardly a snarl, and when a 
young dog, scarcely more than a puppy, took his 
track, he climbed a tree and tried to conceal 
himself among its leaves and branches. He 
showed no desire to fight, and kept looking 
around for some chance of escape. 
Before the men came up he had many chances 
to spring on the dog’s back and kill him with 
a blow and a bite, but the baying took his nerve, 
and he -behaved about like my lady’s tabby up a 
telegraph pole with a yellow cur snapping at her 
heels and ragged boys egging him on. He climbed 
a little higher at each bark of the dog, and 
seemed to try to pull his skin over his head and 
hide behind it. When wounded in chest and 
shoulder, then he wouldn’t fight, but jumped to 
the ground with a scared and quavering scream, 
ran until the dog nipped him once or twice, then 
climbed again and waited in the fork of a dead 
Tee for the shot that sent a soft nosed bullet 
through his brain. This, mind you was a lion, 
a mountain lion, king of beasts! 
The same year, in six weeks of hunting, and 
there were no laggards in the party, only two 
more cougars were seen. One was routed out 
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