684 
FOREST AND STREAM 
“Two Bears Apparently Unconcerned Stood in the Path.” 
Panguitch Lake has one gala day, the 24th 
of July, the Mormon’s great holiday. Then it 
is the gathering place for southern Utah. For 
days the people of Kanax, St. George, Cedar, 
Parowan, Beaver, Panguitch and a host of small¬ 
er settlements make preparations for the festival. 
On horseback and in great white covered family 
wagons they come, until the lake, three miles 
long by one mile wide, is surrounded by a city 
of canvas. It is reported that on the last 24th 
but three able-bodied adult males were left in 
Panguitch, a settlement of 961 souls. However 
this may be, every year from 3,000 to 5,000 people 
gather at the lake and spend three days in 
eating and drinking, in horse racing and foot 
racing, in rowing and fishing, in buying terra 
alba candy, snow ice cream, circus lemonade, 
cheap tintypes, etc., and last but not least, in 
dancing. Then the canvas disappears as noise¬ 
lessly and suddenly as it came, and naught is 
left to mark the place of revelry but ashes, 
oyster cans and broken beer bottles. 
Driving slowly about the west shore we se¬ 
lected a camping place as suitable as it was beau¬ 
tiful; an elevated, grassy point dotted with scat¬ 
tering pines and flanked by a crystal stream that 
leaped and laughed in the sunset glow, beneath 
the soft Italian sky. Beneath two pines we set 
our tent and fixed our fire-place. Ben and Sho¬ 
shone made the beds, tables and seats while 
Jack and Dan got supper. The ducks near the 
point had risen with loud clamor at our approach, 
but as we ate they drifted back within easy gun¬ 
shot, as though fear of man was to them some¬ 
thing unknown. Perhaps it was so, for the west¬ 
ern mountaineer uses no weapon but the rifle. 
He may have, among his lares and penates, an 
old, rusty, long-barreled, anti-bellum muzzle- 
loader, but the breechloader is to him a new¬ 
fangled invention, “like the locomotive,” and of 
the hammerless self-ejector be knows as little 
as of the telephone or phonograph. So much 
the better. Shoshone was prepared to profit by 
their neglect. In the twilight hour we strolled 
down to the nearest ranch and made arrange¬ 
ments for a supply of milk during our stay. 
This cost us, delivered, 12% cents per gallon. 
Then came the smoker’s hour about the camp¬ 
fire—the last and most delicious hour of the 
day, when earth and its cares steal gently from 
us, borne to dreamland on the balmy evening 
breeze, when the stars come out one by one, and 
brighten with joy as they see their own radiant 
forms reflected in the darkening lake, when we 
hear the music of the past and live again the 
days of auld lang syne. So night fell upon the 
world and sweet sleep upon wearied eyelids, and 
the silvery waves alone, that rythmically rose 
and fell upon the glistening sands, watched and 
waited for the dawn of another day. 
“Hist!” 
That was all Ben said, but it was sufficient 
to awake Shoshone, and a few moments later 
a couple of misty forms stole out into the cold, 
bracing air of early morning, leaving Jack and 
Dan to sleep the sleep of the just, and to have 
breakfast ready when the sun should be an hour 
high. There was a light fleece over the water, 
and above this, over the eastern mountain, the 
morning star was beginning to pale. 
“Which way, Ben?” 
“Oh, I believe I’ll go up the canyon after a 
yearlin’. Don’t you want to take Jack’s gun 
and go ’long?” 
“Not much. I’m going for a mess of chick¬ 
ens. So long.” 
A pull at the half-filled coffee pot that rested 
in the ashes of last night’s fire and we separated. 
And this was Sept. 1, the day when the hunter 
and sportsman could bang away at any and 
every species of game that he could hope to 
find, and in all this region only Ben and Sho¬ 
shone to take advantage of the privilege. Sho¬ 
shone’s path led him about the foot of the lake, 
down to the meadows where he knew the birds 
would take their early breakfast. Nervously 
he fingered the shells that had been loaded with 
so much care and precision. If there is a species 
of “buck-ager,” called “chicken-ager” by special¬ 
ists, he was afflicted with the disease, and a 
Pennsylvania barn door would have been safe 
at 40 yards. From his feet rises a gray form 
and goes whirring away into the gloom. The 
