"Heii, yii-here, you brute deevil. You let me go I keel you," shrieked Pedro. But the words, that would have made the bear cringe and skulk a few hours before, held no terror for him. He was master now, and this man who had clubbed and prodded, sworn at, and outraged him, was a pigmy in his arms. His powerful jaw too was close to the man's neck. One crunch would make him lifeless.

Then Pedro, with more ferocity than judgment, began kicking, hoping to frighten the bear, who had always skulked at his slightest word. But the growl of rage with which Black Bruin greeted this move fairly froze the blood in Pedro's veins, especially when he felt the great brute half open his jaws as though to bite through his neck.

Then Pedro became wise and sought by kind words to persuade the bear into releasing him.

"Gude Freetzie, gude beastie. Don't, Freetzie, don't."

But those platitudes were received as uncompromisingly by Black Bruin as were the kicks. He evidently would have no parleying of any sort. The man had been weighed in the balance and found entirely wanting.

There was still one very slight hope left, however. If Pedro could only reach his stiletto, even with his hands pinioned to his sides, he might be able to plunge it into the brute's side down low and inflict a wound that would cause the bear to loose his hold for a second, when he might wrench himself free and deliver a second fatal thrust.

The stiletto was in a sheath and Pedro could just reach the point. His only hope was to work it loose, then with a quick motion jump it out, and catch it as it fell. It was a desperate chance, but all that was left to him.

His slightest movement brought blood-curdling growls from Black Bruin, who evidently did not intend to take any chances with him.

At the same instant that Pedro began reaching for his stiletto, Black Bruin started marching him up the road into the woods. Where he was taking him and what new horror awaited him the Italian could not imagine.

Inch by inch he carefully worked the stiletto higher and higher in the sheath. Then with a quick upward motion of his hand, he jumped it clear of the leather and clutched for the handle as it fell. But his fingers barely glazed the steel, the weapon fell to the earth, and his last hope was gone.

About fifty feet down the road, Black Bruin wheeled his captive sharply to the right and taking a few steps in that direction, they stood upon the brink of the precipice, at the bottom of which was the foaming, dashing, turbulent stream.

As though to make the horror of the situation even more intense, the moon which had been under a cloud, came out and shone peacefully into the yawning depths. In the silver moonlight the white foam on the water looked as soft as wool; but Pedro knew that beneath the froth and foam were the jagged and hungry rocks that made it.

There they remained for the space of ten seconds, the dark, cruel, sinister little man, held in the inexorable grip of the great shaggy beast. Each second the crushing arms of the bear tightened and the man's breath came in gasps and sobs. His tongue protruded from his mouth, and his eyes bulged out of their sockets with fear and pain. Blood dripped from his nose and his ribs creaked as the infuriated beast slowly crushed him.

When the figure of his tormentor no longer struggled in his arms, Black Bruin opened his powerful jaws and with a single bite crushed the vertebras of the neck. Then, with a grunt of deep satisfaction, he lifted the limp figure in his arms as high as he could, and flung it into the yawning chasm below.

He peered over the railing and saw it strike upon the rocks beneath, hang for a moment uncertain and disappear in the dark eddy.

Then he dropped on all fours and hurried back to camp, where he demolished everything of Pedro's meagre outfit, not forgetting to tear his coat to shreds. This done to his evident satisfaction, he obeyed the call from the deep woods, that had been so insistent in his ear all that spring and summer, and shuffled away into the gloom.

The dark plumes of fir and pines sighed, "Come," and the night wind whispered, "Come," and the rustling fronds and grasses said, "Come." All nature welcomed the exile to this, his native wilderness.



CHAPTER IX

LIFE IN THE WILD

It was with a wild exultant sense of being free that Black Bruin shuffled through the underbrush and entered the deep woods on this, his first night of actual freedom. Some of the native ferocity of his kind coursed in his veins. Had he not within the hour slain his tormentor—the inexplicable creature who had tyrannized over him and bullied and beaten him for more than a year? But mingled with his triumph was a faint sense of fear that caused him to put many miles between himself and the deep gorge before he stopped for food or rest. True, he had seen the limp, lifeless figure fall into the abyss and then disappear in the dark stream. Still, he might come to life in some miraculous way and pursue him.

It was under most peculiar circumstances that this alien returned to his native wilderness;—circumstances that we shall have to consider briefly to understand why so many mishaps befell him during his first year of freedom.

From the first moment that the fuzzy little bear-cubs follow their huge mother from the den into the open world, their lessons of life begin. These lessons are acquired partly through imitation and also through design upon the part of the wise old dam. Nearly all small creatures are imitative, so, as the old bear did only those things that were for her good, the cubs soon learned by imitation which of the wild creatures to be upon good terms with and which were to be let alone.

The cubs always stay with their mother for a year, usually denning up with her the first fall, and only being deserted when the new cubs come; so it will be seen that this early training and discipline is of the greatest importance. Knowledge that is not gained in this way is usually gained by hard knocks.

At last, being winded and tired with his long flight, Black Bruin crawled into a deep thicket and went to sleep. When he awoke, it was very early morning, just the time of day that he and Pedro had been in the habit of starting on the road.

No more road for him, but if Black Bruin could not get his breakfast at a farm-house, he must seek it elsewhere, for he was fairly ravenous this balmy summer morning.

He remembered his old grub and ant-hunting habit and was soon busy turning over flat stones and pulling to pieces old rotten logs, where there was usually good picking. But it took a great many of these little crawlers and creepers to satisfy a half-famished bear.

Finally, Black Bruin scented a chipmunk in a small pile of stones, and hastily began pulling the pile apart to get at the prize.

Poor Chippy, hearing his house tumbling about his head and seeing his retreat rapidly cut off, burrowed deeper and deeper in the stone-heap, but finally the monster was almost upon him. When one more stone had been lifted, he would be at the bear's mercy. So, with a frightened squeak, Chippy made a break for freedom, hoping to gain a stone wall that he knew was near by.

Thump, thump, thump, went the heavy paws all about him as he dodged hither and thither, uttering a quick succession of terrified squeaks.

At last one of the great paws fell fairly upon him and his life was crushed out, while Black Bruin had the keen satisfaction of feeling warm blood in his mouth.

This success put new enthusiasm into the hunter and he pulled stones and logs about for an hour or two in a lively manner.

He did not find any more chipmunks and was about to give up hunting for that morning and go in search of water, when a small black and white creature with a bushy tail attracted his attention. It was about the size of a cat but the body scent was not that of a cat.

Whatever it was, it was small and slow, and could be easily caught and killed. Whether or not it was good to eat could be determined later, so the hunter hurried after the small black and white creature that looked so harmless.

A few quick shuffles carried Black Bruin alongside the quarry and, within striking distance, his heavy paw went up, but at that moment the wood pussy arched his back and delivered his own best defense full in the bear's nose and eyes.

With a loud "ugh," and a grunt and squeal of pain, Black Bruin retreated into the nearest thicket.

It seemed as though liquid fire had been dashed in his eyes, and of all the obnoxious smells that ever disgusted his nostrils, this was the worst. His eyes smarted and burned, and the more he rubbed them the worse they became.

He was nearly blinded and so had to go groping and stumbling through the woods to the nearest brook, to which his wild instinct guided him in some miraculous manner. Here he plunged in his face up to his ears and was slightly relieved.

For an hour he repeated the operation over and over, plunging his head under and keeping it there as long as he could hold his breath.

At last the burning, smarting fluid was partly washed from both eyes and nostrils, and Black Bruin went upon his way a wiser and sorrier beast.

It was two or three days before the inflammation entirely left his eyes and his nostrils got back their old sure power of discriminating between the many scents of the forest.

He had learned his first lesson in the woods, which was that a well-behaved skunk when taking his morning walk, is not to be disturbed.

After this, whenever Black Bruin even scented a skunk, he kept at a discreet distance and contented himself with chipmunks and mice.

One morning he surprised a fox eating a rabbit which it had just caught in a briar-patch, and made such a sudden rush upon Reynard that he fled in hot haste, leaving the rabbit for the bear. In this way Black Bruin learned that rabbit was good to eat, even as palatable as squirrel, and after that he hunted rabbits whenever opportunity offered.

Sometimes he would find a gray rabbit's hole and with much labor dig the poor rabbit out. More frequently he would watch at the mouth of a rabbit-burrow, where he had seen a rabbit enter, until bunny reappeared, sticking his head out cautiously to reconnoitre, when one swift stroke of the heavy paw bagged the game.

It was one day after having watched for several hours at the mouth of a rabbit-burrow, that Black Bruin discovered a queer creature, three or four times the size of a rabbit, walking leisurely along through the woods, and went in hot pursuit.

By this time, the experience with the skunk had lost its old terror, and he was again the curious, keen hunter.

Whatever it was, the newcomer did not seem to be much afraid of him, and that was strange. Most of the wild creatures he knew fled at his first approach, and it was with difficulty that he got near them; but this queer animal ambled along as slowly as if he had not the slightest concern.

He did not look or smell like anything that Black Bruin had ever observed before. The odd thing about him was that he was covered with small sharp points sticking out in every direction, which gave him a very bristling appearance.

As the bear came up, he merely squatted upon the ground and drew himself into a rotund shape. What a strange creature! Black Bruin reached his nose closer to get a better whiff of the body scent, and if possible to discover what the animal was.

Quick as a flash the porcupine's tail struck upward and three of the longest, sharpest quills in this queer body were firmly planted in the hunter's nose.

With a growl of pain and rage the bear dealt this strange enemy a crushing blow. The porcupine's back was broken, but the conqueror carried off four more quills in his paw.



It was not much like a conqueror that he went, for he limped off on three legs, and sitting down in a thicket, pulled the quills from his paw as well as he could; but two were broken off and finally worked through the foot, coming out a day or two later on the upper side.

The paw was so sore that he could not travel on it, and the afflicted bear either went upon three legs, or kept quiet.

Two of the quills in his lower jaw he got rid of, but one stayed with him for several days, and finally made its appearance in his cheek, coming out near the ear.

The experience was a sorry one, and although several days afterward Black Bruin saw the dead body of the porcupine lying where he had crushed it, he would not go near it. This creature, like the skunk, had a peculiar way of fighting which the bear could not understand, so he would give the next porcupine that he met the entire road if he wanted it.

Black Bruin's relations with man had been most peculiar up to the time of his killing his cruel master and escape into the wild, and they did not tend to make him wise in regard to this creature, which all normal wild animals shun as their greatest danger.

He had been brought up in close companionship with men; had slept and ate with them for the first three or four years of his life. He had wrestled with the men cubs and had found in it nothing but sheer delight. Children and their caresses had been his one pleasure during the strenuous year with Pedro.

Now, suddenly all this relationship toward man was changed. Black Bruin had gone from the pale of civilization into that of savagery. He was now a wild beast, feared by men, although without much cause.

Little by little this new relationship between himself and the man beast was borne in upon Black Bruin. At first, he shunned men and their way, fearing that some man might capture him and again claim him for the road. The wild, free life made him glad. To be here to-day and there to-morrow was to his liking, and he did not intend to live again upon a chain.

But that Black Bruin's long companionship with men was a disadvantage to him in his new life was only too apparent, for it led him into indiscretions, which a normal bear would never have committed.

In his natural state the bear is a very wary animal, always upon the watch, even when he is feeding; always and forever testing the wind with both ear and nostril. But with the half-domesticated dancing-bear it was different. In his own mind he had nothing to fear from men. He had walked through their villages and along their country roads and seen them by thousands and tens of thousands. They had never harmed him, and he had no reason to think they ever would.

One September morning he was digging roots along the edge of the woods. He had found something quite to his liking and was much absorbed, when suddenly a fresh puff of wind blew the strong body scent of a man full into his nostrils. He looked this way and that but could see no man. Then a twig snapped in the cover near at hand, and a squirrel hunter stepped into view, not fifty feet away. The hunter was probably much more astonished than was Black Bruin. The great shaggy brute was so close to him that he looked like a veritable monster.

With the hunter's instinct, that acts almost before the mind has time to think, the gun went to his shoulder and both barrels were discharged in such quick succession as to call for merely one echo.

The hunter was of course not in search of bears, so the two charges of number four shot did not have a mortal effect upon the quarry, but at such close range they penetrated quite deeply into his flesh and stung him with an excruciating pain. With a loud "Hoof," and an agonized grunt of pain, the bear fled precipitately in one direction, and the hunter, thinking that he had jeopardized his life by his rashness in attacking a bear with squirrel shot, fled in another.

The man did not stop running until he reached the nearest farmhouse, where he excitedly gasped out his adventure to wide-eyed listeners, while Black Bruin fled as far as he could into the deep woods, to nurse his many wounds.

There was little, however, that he could do. The wounds were not dangerous, but they burned and smarted as though a whole swarm of bees had penetrated his thick coat and found the skin beneath.

He spent the better part of the day lying in a cooling stream, waiting for the burning and smarting to cease.

He had now added one more to the list of his sad experiences in the wild. The man-scent was dangerous and henceforth he must flee at the slightest suspicion of the proximity of man. The rank sulphurous smell of gunpowder, too, and the roar, like thunder, that echoed away through the cavernous woods, were things that he would remember.

Man, who he had thought was quite harmless, was a terrible enemy who could sting him in a thousand places at once, and shake the forest with thunder and lightning.

Even while Black Bruin lay wallowing in the stream, trying to ease the burning shotgun wounds, there was being planned in the near-by village a bear-hunt that should bring about his destruction, for the excited hunter had described a monster as large as a cow.



CHAPTER X

THE GREAT BEAR-HUNT

The hair-raising story that the young squirrel-hunter told, created quite an excitement among villagers near by, but on second consideration the older and wiser heads were inclined to discredit it. The imaginative Nimrod had probably seen a black stump or dark moss-covered rock, which, in the excitement of the moment, he did not stop to investigate. He had fired upon the instant and then fled without taking further inventory of the place. It was doubtless one of those hallucinations that are so common in the woods. Bears had not been plentiful in the region for several years, so at first the story was discredited.

About a week later Grandpa Hezekiah Butterfield, one of the old men of the village, went about a mile into the country to a farmhouse to take supper with an old crony and to talk over old times.

As is usual when two grandpas get to talking over old times, Grandpa Butterfield stayed much later than he intended, starting for home at about eight o'clock. But when he went, he felt well repaid for his visit, because he had completely out-talked his companion and moreover was carrying back a present of five pounds of honey, which, as the old man had a sweet tooth, the only tooth he had, was most acceptable.

Just after leaving the farmhouse, the way led through a deep woods which overhung the road, making it quite dark in places.

It happened that on this same evening Black Bruin went forth on one of his nightly prowls.

It was a moonlight night and the wood-mice were out in force, scampering about and squeaking, having the finest kind of a play. In the course of his stalking this small game, Black Bruin came to within a few rods of the road. He was sniffing about an old log which smelled strongly of mice when a fresh puff of the wind brought him a strong man-scent.

At this dread odor the hair rose upon his neck and fear told him to slip quietly away in the opposite direction from which the scent came.

He was about to obey this instinct when the wind again freshened and a new odor filled his nostrils. It was not as strong as the man-scent and it did not fill him with fear, but with delight. It made his mouth drip saliva and filled him with an insatiate craving for something, he could not remember just what.

Then the old sweet smell, that was to him what whisky is to the drunkard, brought back a familiar picture. It was of a farmhouse with barns and many out-buildings. There were hens, ducks and turkeys in the yard and back of the house was a row of beehives that always emitted this ravishing odor.

It was honey, and at the realization Black Bruin could almost hear the low droning of the hive, or the angry zip, zip of the bees about his ears as he robbed them.

Again the night-wind brought the man-scent and the smell of honey. The former filled him with fear and the latter with delight. Again and again he tested the wind, weighing the two odors, and at last the honey conquered.

The man might fill him with thorns and prickers from his thunder and lightning stick, but he must have some of that honey.

Grandpa Butterfield was walking leisurely along humming a psalm tune, as was his wont when well pleased with the world, when he thought he heard something behind him in the road.

He stopped and listened, but all was still. Only the usual night-sounds came to his ears. But when he moved on, he felt sure that the footsteps again followed.

At last he reached a point where the moonlight fell across the road. He now felt quite sure that something was coming after him but what, he could not imagine. Feeling curious, and a bit uneasy, for the road was a lonely one, he turned and looked behind and there, in the full moonlight, not forty feet away, he beheld a huge black bear following surely in his footsteps.

There was no deceiving his eye. He had seen too many bears in days gone by.

Grandpa Butterfield quickened his walk to a trot, which in a dozen steps he increased to as lively a run as a man of seventy years could muster.

Black Bruin, feeling, now that the man was running, he was afraid of him, and seeing his precious honey rapidly moving away down the road, went in hot pursuit.

By the time the old man had covered a hundred feet, his breath came in quick asthmatic gasps. Craning his stiff neck to see if he had distanced his pursuer, he saw to his horror that the bear was not twenty feet behind him. Terror now lent wings to his rheumatic old legs, and he sprinted another hundred feet in much quicker time than he had the first.

But Black Bruin now felt sure that the honey was his. The man creature was clearly afraid of him, so he too increased his pace.

Poor Grandpa Butterfield could almost feel the bear's hot breath upon his back as he ran. Ten seconds more, he told himself, and he would be in the clutches of this brute. His obituary and the account of his tragic death would surely be in the county paper next week.

Suddenly his half-paralyzed brain was electrified by a thought. It was the honey that the bear was after, and not him. Who ever heard of a bear wanting to eat an old dried-up man, who was as tough as leather?

Without a second's delay he pitched the honey into the road behind him, and continued his frantic flight.

A few rods farther on, feeling that he was no longer pursued, he glanced back just long enough to see the bear tearing the paper from the package and licking out the honey.

That evening at the country grocery the bear-story of the squirrel-hunter was amply corroborated by Grandpa Butterfield, who was so winded and spent with running that he could barely gasp out his disconnected account of the chase through the woods.

The next morning, with Grandpa Butterfield as a guide, several men went over the ground, where there was plenty of evidence to substantiate the old man's story. The empty honey-frames were there, and the bear-tracks told as plainly as words that a bear, of unusual size, had given the old man the run of his life through the woods.

Grandpa Butterfield was the hero of the village, both for that day and several following, and the long-talked-of bear-hunt was at once organized.

There was but one rifle in the village, and that was a 38-55 Winchester, the property of the young hunter from the city, who had filled Black Bruin's coat with squirrel-shot. So old rusty shotguns were got out and cleaned up in readiness for the fray. Some of them had not seen service recently, with the exception of once or twice a year, when they were used to scare off the crows or to frighten a woodchuck which was making too free with the beans.

Boys hunted up old rusty bullet-moulds and ran bullets, and the shotguns were loaded with slugs and buckshot.

Those who were not fortunate enough even to possess a disreputable old gun, armed themselves with pitchforks, so that altogether it was a motley armed party that started out one early October morning to annihilate Black Bruin.

The dogs comprising the pack were half-breed hounds and beagles, with two or three pure-blood foxhounds.

By rare good fortune a farmer, coming into town early, had seen the bear crossing the road ahead of his team, so that the dogs could be shown the trail at once.

But when the hunters pointed out the hand-shaped track in the road and said "seek," the hair rose upon the dogs' backs and they stuck their tails between their legs and interpreted "seek," as meaning that they were to seek their own homes by the shortest path. This new rank animal scent had no attraction for them. They had not lost any bear. In other words, they would not follow.

Here was a difficulty that the hunters had not foreseen, and for a time it looked as though the hunt was doomed to end then and there.

Finally some one in the party said, "We ought to have taken along Ben Holcome's Growler. Growler ain't afraid of the devil himself."

Growler was a mongrel, half-hound and half-bulldog. He had not nose enough to follow alone, but as had been said, he wasn't afraid of anything. So as there was nothing else to do, a boy was sent cross-lots after Growler, while the hunters waited impatiently.

Growler and the boy at last put in an appearance, and the mongrel was shown the bear-track in the road.

Growler's hair likewise rose up on his neck, but his lips also parted in a snarl and he started off on the fresh track, uttering excited yelps. Growler thought he scented a good fight ahead, and he would rather chew on a good adversary any day than upon a piece of beefsteak.

Seeing what was expected of them, and made courageous by Growler's example, the pack followed at full cry, and the great bear-hunt was on in earnest.

Black Bruin heard them almost at the outset, where he was digging roots in the deep woods, and for some reason the sounds annoyed him. He knew they were made by dogs, for he had often heard the old hound Hecla at the farmhouse running rabbits in the near-by swamp.

But here, there were half-a-dozen hounds instead of one, and their baying was fairly clamorous.

Finally, the pack entered the woods not forty rods away, and Black Bruin began to get uneasy. At last it dawned upon him, as the pack drew still nearer and nearer, that; they were upon his track. This thought filled him with both fear and rage. What did these curs want of him? Had he not killed a dog that was worrying him, while with Pedro, with a single blow?

So he crouched in a thicket and waited expectantly. He had not long to wait, for in fifteen seconds the pack came up. When they discovered the bear so near at hand, however, and saw what menacing game they had been running, the hounds all slunk back to a safe distance, and sat on their tails. But not so Growler.

Here was the scrap of his life with an animal three times as large as the big Newfoundland, whom he was in the habit of worrying. So he rushed into the thicket and sprang at Black Bruin's throat.



But quick as he was, he was not as quick as his adversary, who ripped open the side of his head with a lucky blow, and stretched him gasping upon the ground. Black Bruin then reached down and biting the kicking dog through the neck, finished his troubles in short order.

Growler uttered one agonized cry, and stretched out dead. This was enough for the rest of the pack, all of whom stuck their tails between their legs and ran for their respective masters.

Hearing the cries of men near at hand, Black Bruin slunk out of the thicket and off into the deep woods, but not soon enough to escape a fusillade of buckshot which whizzed about him as he ran, a few of them biting deep into his flesh.

But he was soon lost to sight, and as the pack would not follow, now that Growler was no more, the hunt was finally abandoned for that day.

The next day a bulldog and a bull terrier were procured to take the place of Growler, and the hunt was resumed. But being made wary by this experience, Black Bruin "laid low" and they could not start him.

Each morning for three days they scoured the country, beating the woods and loosing the hounds at all points where the bear had been recently seen, but without success.

The fourth morning a farmer came to town in great haste. The bear had killed a calf the night before and he had discovered the partly eaten carcass buried in the woods near by. Here was the bait that would lure the thief into their hands.

So hunters and hounds went at once to the carcass, where a rather fresh trail was found. Half an hour's pursuit again routed out the bear. Once he took to the open, and the young hunter from the city with the Winchester sent a bullet through his paw, laming him considerably. This would never do, so he doubled back to the woods.

He did not fear this yelping, baying pack as he did the men that were also following him. He now knew that the thunder and lightning that they carried could bite and sting as nothing else could.

For half an hour Black Bruin ran hither and thither, doubling in and out. Finally he remembered his tree-climbing habit and in an evil moment clambered up a tall spruce. In five minutes' time after he scratched up the tree, men and dogs had surrounded his foolish refuge, and his fate seemed sealed.

The last of the party to arrive was the young man with the Winchester, for whom all had been waiting. One shot from him would end the hunt.

They discovered Black Bruin about thirty feet from the ground in a thick whorl of limbs.

The young rifleman was much excited. This would be his first bear. His name would be in the local paper, and he would have a great story to tell when he got back to the city.

Experience would have taught him to draw his bead finer than he did, and also to have lowered his rear sight, which was set for two hundred yards; but taking careless aim, and thinking he could not miss at such short range, he pressed the trigger.

There was a sharp crack from the rifle, and the bullet ploughed a deep wound in Black Bruin's scalp, but glanced from his thick skull and went singing through the tree-tops.

The blow of the bullet upon the skull dazed the bear for a moment, and he loosed his hold and came tumbling down through the interlaced limbs.

But the hard bump that he got at the foot of the tree, brought him to his senses with a jerk. Right among the yelping, snarling pack he had fallen, and in sheer desperation he struck out right and left.

Two of the hounds went yelping to the rear. Then an excited boy leveled a double-barreled shotgun at the bear and discharged both barrels.

At the same instant the best hound in the pack jumped into range and rolled over kicking upon the ground. He had received the full charge.

Half-blinded and dazed by the blow upon his head, and made frantic by the yelping of the pack, the shouts of the men and the roar of their thunder, Black Bruin put all his remaining strength into flight.

Not knowing or seeing which way he went, he fled straight toward the hunter with the Winchester with mouth wide open.

Horrified at the sight, which the hunter interpreted as a desperate charge upon the part of the bear, the city Nimrod delivered one wild shot and then fled for his life, as he thought.

This stampeded the entire hunt, and the terrified men fled as fast as their legs could carry them until they left the spot far behind.

It was a question whether the frantic beast tried harder to get away from the hunters, or they from him.

In the village grocery the stories that were told that night made the small boy's hair stand up with fright and his blood run cold with fear.

As for Black Bruin, with his wounded paw upon which he limped painfully, and with his bleeding scalp, he concluded that the part of the country in which he had made his home for several months, was no place for him, so before another sunrise he put many miles between himself and the scene of his narrow escape from the hunters.

Nor did this one night's journey calm his fear. Night after night he fled, always going in the same direction, which, as he fled northward, carried him farther and farther into the wilderness.

At last in a wild country of rugged mountains and deep, thickly wooded valleys, where the habitat of man seemed far distant, he ceased his flight.

There in the wilderness, where lumbermen alone penetrated, Black Bruin denned up and slept away his fifth winter. His bed was made deep under the top of a fallen hemlock, where the snow drifted above him and covered him with soft white blankets. The only evidence that the outer world had that a bear was sleeping beneath was a small hole in the snow kept open by the warm breath of the sleeper.



CHAPTER XI

A PLEASANT COMPANION

When Black Bruin awoke from his long sleep, stretched himself, and sallied forth into the open world, the first faint touch of red was appearing upon the soft maples. Buds upon the other trees had not started and there were yet suggestions of the chill of melting snow-banks upon the air. The tones of the forest were still somber, light gray-green or ash color, suggesting the funeral pile of the last year.

If the sun shone brightly for an hour, there might come a dash of hail the next and a chilling blast of wind that seemed to retard the oncoming spring for a whole month.

Life hung in the balance, the seasons coquetted, gray-haired old Winter trifling and flirting with the warm, blushing, sweet-breathed Spring.

The awakening had not yet come. It might come the next week, or, if the spring was exceptionally late, it might not come until the next month.

In accordance with his usual spring custom Black Bruin fasted for several days, eating only grasses, buds and roots. This satisfied him until the thick layers of fat, with which he had come forth from his winter sleep, disappeared and then he became ravenous, "as ravenous as a wolf," as the proverb says.

He hunted mice persistently, but mice seemed not to be as plentiful in the wilderness as they were nearer civilization. Squirrels also were not as numerous here as nearer the abode of man.

Most people, when they go to the great woods, expect to find them teeming with all kinds of life, and are much disappointed to find that song-birds and squirrels are decidedly more plentiful in their home village than in the wilderness. Many of the birds and smaller animals are social little creatures and love to be near the abode of man, while others live upon the scatterings which agriculture deigns not to pick up.

One day Black Bruin was following along the banks of a good-sized stream, looking for frogs, or anything, for that matter, which might fit into a bear menu, when to his great astonishment he discovered another bear, not as large as himself, sitting upon a flat rock a few feet from the shore, watching the stream intently. Black Bruin had never seen any of his kind before and a feeling of curiosity and friendly inquiry came over him. He did not go at once to make the acquaintance of the stranger, but kept very quiet and watched to see what she was doing.



He did not have long to wait, for a gust of wind soon dropped a bit of bark upon the stream near the crouching bear. There was a spray of water, and a flash of the silver sides of the salmon as it darted to the surface. Then the bear on the rock reached down with her paw and, with a lightning-like motion, batted the fish out of the water and well up on the bank.

Black Bruin, during his year of wild life, had found several dead fish, which he had eaten with great relish. So, without waiting to consider that the prize did not belong to him, he started out of the bushes for it.

But the real fisherman rushed at him with such ferocity that he quickly retreated to cover and sat watching while she killed the fish.

When it had been dispatched, the lucky fisherman took it in her mouth and went away into the woods with the prize. Black Bruin followed at a distance, smelling of the bushes, where the fish brushed in passing, leaving a tantalizing scent.

Finally, the bear with the fish stopped under some spruces and began eating it.

Soon two fuzzy shuffling little creatures joined her. What they were or where they came from Black Bruin did not know. They seemed not to care much for the fish which the old bear offered them, but preferred to romp and tumble about in the jolliest kind of frolic.

In the old days there had been a litter of puppies at the farmhouse. These queer little creatures were about the size of puppies, but Black Bruin did not think they were small dogs.

When the fish had been eaten, the three went away farther into the woods, the two small creatures following in the footsteps of their mother.

Then Black Bruin went up and smelled of their tracks and his good nose told him that they were small bears.

After that Black Bruin saw the old bear and her two cubs often, but she would not let him come near them, and did not evince much friendliness for him. But he had learned one valuable lesson and the following day was upon the flat rock watching for fish.

He did not get one that day or the next, but he had patience, which all fishermen must have, and the third day got his fish.

It was much larger than the one he had seen the strange bear take and it made him a fine meal. After that he was a tireless fisherman.

One morning Black Bruin discovered a little dappled fawn following its mother gleefully through the fragrant breeze-haunted forest, and remembering his calf-killing episode, just before the bear-hunt, he approached cautiously. This was not a calf, for the habitation of man had been left far behind. Calves he had made the acquaintance of when he was the farmhouse pet, in those far-off days. This was a wilderness creature and it belonged to him if he could kill it, as did all the wild creatures that he could master.

This is the universal cry of the woods,—food, food, food; and it is the cry of civilization as well. There is no dingle dell, where the harebell and the anemone grow, where the pine and the spruce stand darkling and sweet peace seems to fold her wings and sit brooding, but danger is there. Danger that crawls and creeps and runs with great bounds. Danger upon velvety paws, that fall on the mosses of the forest carpet as lightly as an autumn leaf; danger that slinks in gray protectively colored forms which pass like shadows; danger upon wings, as sure and speedy as the hunter's arrow,—wings fringed with down, that their coming may be noiseless and fatal.

The tiny wood-mouse scampers gleefully in the dead leaves, but above him and about him are a dozen dangers. The nervous cottontail sits erect upon his haunches, his nose twitches and his large trumpet-like ears are turned this way and that to catch the slightest sound. His whole attitude is one of intense watching and listening, and well he may, for his enemies are legion and in every thicket, bush and tree-top a dark danger is lurking.

This is the war of the woods. The old, old story of carnage, life that takes life that the breath of life may not go out of the nostrils. Cruel as fate is the law of the woods, but it is also the law of the shambles and carnivorous man.

Black Bruin was not as well versed in hunting as most of his wild kindred, so he did not take the precaution to get upon the windward side of his game. The ever-watchful mother scented danger long before he got within striking distance. Her white flag went up and she led her offspring at a breakneck pace from the place, but Black Bruin had marked them for his own and it was only a matter of patience.

For several days he watched their coming and going, until at last he discovered where the mother left her offspring while she went to a distant lake to feed upon lily-pads.

The little dappled deer was hidden under a fallen tree-top and one day, while the doe was gone, he fell upon the helpless fawn, which, according to the unwritten law of the forest, was his legitimate meat.

With a swift sure rush and a savage snarl, he brought the little deer from hiding. There was a short, swift chase, an agonized bleat or two, and Black Bruin had a breakfast that well repaid him for all his watching and waiting.

The same afternoon he saw the mother, wild-eyed and bleating, racing wildly up and down the forest, asking, by terrified looks and actions, "Have you seen my little dappled fawn? He is gone and there is strong bear-scent about the tree-top where I hid him." For several days she haunted the region and her anxiety and heedlessness of her own safety nearly caused her to fall a victim to the wary hunter, but she finally disappeared altogether.

It was not until the full glory of mid-summer was over the land that Black Bruin met White Nose in a blueberry patch upon a barren hillside. At first she would have nothing to do with him, but he followed her so persistently that she was at last obliged to take notice.

For a long time something in earth and air had been calling to Black Bruin,—something that he craved above all other things; but what it was he never knew until he rubbed muzzles with White Nose and felt her warm breath in his face. Then he knew that he had found what he wanted and that the old loneliness would not haunt him again.

But there was one thing about him that made his mate most suspicious and it took much patient coaxing upon Black Bruin's part to overcome her misgivings. This was the strong leather collar that the former dancing-bear still wore about his neck.

It was the collar into which Pedro had fastened the chain during the latter part of the bear's captivity. This White Nose could not understand. In all her experience she had never seen a bear wearing such a thing as this. The man-scent about it, too, made it still more alarming. But at last her prejudice was overcome, and the two came and went together during the rest of the summer and the early autumn.

From her Black Bruin learned many of the secrets of the woods that had hitherto been hidden from him. White Nose had been reared in the wild, so all her senses were keen and the woods and waters were her hunting-ground.

Together they caught salmon at a shallow point in the stream where all they had to do was to sit upon a rock and knock them out on the bank as they passed. Together, in the early autumn, they raided a beaver colony, breaking into the houses and killing several of the members. Black Bruin thought he had never tasted anything in his life quite so delicious as beaver-meat.

White Nose also taught him how to lie in wait for the deer in a clump of bushes by some pathway that they were in the habit of following, or by the lick, or perhaps by a spring where they often came to drink, and then, before they suspected their presence, to make a sudden rush.

She showed him a hollow birch-stub, in which a family of raccoons dwelt, and together they set to work to destroy the household of their own smaller brother. They dug and tore at the base of the stub until they had undermined it, and then together pushed it over.

At first the raccoon family were much astonished and terrified at the commotion outside their dwelling, and when finally the house came down, three sleek raccoons fled in as many directions. White Nose secured one and Black Bruin another, while the third escaped.

The last thing in the autumn, before they denned up, the two bears made a long journey of several days to the nearest settlement, where they killed several sheep, and also carried off two small pigs. In this stealing, Black Bruin took the lead, for he knew much better the ways of man, and the danger from his thunder and lightning than did his companion.

Upon this good supply of mutton and pork they laid on the final layers of fat, and then returned to their wilderness and denned up for the winter.



CHAPTER XII

THE KING OF THE MOUNTAIN

The following spring, when Black Bruin came forth from hibernation, he went one day's journey nearer to the settlements and took up headquarters in a rugged and heavily timbered series of mountains, which were admirably adapted to his purpose.

Whenever he awoke during his winter nap he still tasted pork and mutton from the autumn raid. Henceforth he must have more of that diet. So the reason for his changing his base of operations will be readily seen. One day's journey would carry him back into the wilderness, with its fine resources for fishing and hunting, while a day's travel in the opposite direction would bring him to the outskirts of the settlements, within easy striking distance of plunder.

At his first meeting with White Nose, he found her most unresponsive to his advances, considering the fact that they had come and gone together all through the autumn. The reason for her indifference was soon discovered, for Black Bruin saw that she had two little fuzzy cubs in tow;—one with a smutty white nose like her own, and the other with a dark muzzle like Black Bruin's. If Black Bruin knew that these were his offspring, he did not evince much interest in them, while White Nose would hardly let him go near them. Perhaps she was afraid that he might eat them, or maybe it was only maternal jealousy, which is always strong in wild mothers.

For several days after taking up his abode in the mountains, Black Bruin contented himself with a vegetarian diet, varied with fish and small game, but the blood-lust soon came upon him and he began prowling about the settlements.

At first, his reconnoitering was unsuccessful; but one day he discovered an animal four or five times as large as a deer, feeding in an open field near the woods. This would not have interested him much had not the large creature been followed by a little animal of the same kind. He never would have thought of attacking the mother, but the calf was easily within his scope and he began shadowing them with the persistence of a good hunter.

Black Bruin knew that these creatures were the property of men. He had often watched the cattle feeding when he lived near the scene of the great bear-hunt, but with the exception of the calf he had killed upon that eventful morning, he had never molested them.

Even now, he associated the killing of the calf with the baying of hounds and danger, but he was now much wiser and stronger. He felt that he could get away to the mountains long before men would discover their loss. He could even fight if need be.

Of all the bears in the region he was easily the strongest and heaviest and his life with White Nose the fall before had taught him many things.

One morning the young heifer hid her little red calf in a thicket just as the doe had her fawn and went to feed in the open near by.

This was Black Bruin's opportunity, and swift and sure like the good hunter he had now become, he approached. The deer mother had not offered to attack him and he did not think this one would, so he did not pay much attention to her.

He crept as near as he could without scaring the game and then with a swift pounce was upon it. He struck the calf a blow that should have broken its neck, but the calf moved at just the critical moment and received a glancing stroke. With a bleat of pain and fear it sprang up and fled toward its mother. It took only two jumps, for a second blow laid it low, with just enough life left to kick.

Black Bruin seized the prize by the head and began dragging it into the bushes. But he had not gone far when the heifer was upon him like a whirlwind. He aimed a blow at her head which deprived her of one horn, but this did not stop her charge. She caught him fairly in the chest and sent him sprawling.

Her remaining horn ploughed a deep wound in his shoulder and the force of the contact knocked the breath out of him, but it also aroused his fighting blood and put him upon his guard.

When the heifer came for him the second time, he ripped open her nose and eluded her charge, but in no way dampened her fighting ardor.

Ordinarily she would have fled from the bear like the wind, but her maternal affection had been aroused and wounded and no matter how timid the wild mother, it will usually fight desperately when its young are assailed.

Now that the bear was upon his guard, the heifer was hardly a match for him, for he could usually elude her charges and punish her sorely at each rush; but one thing was certain: It would be no easy matter to carry off the dead calf, and carry on such a fight as this at the same time.

In five minutes the cow was covered with blood and her hide had been deeply lacerated in many places, while Black Bruin still had but one wound, that in his shoulder.

Little by little the heifer's frenzy was worn out, until at last she retired to a distance and pawed the ground and bellowed. But when Black Bruin sought to carry off the calf, she was back again fighting every inch of the ground and often causing him to abandon the carcass for a time.

When she stood over the dead calf, licking the blood from its wounds and caressing and nosing it, trying in her dumb way to bring it back to life, she was a pathetic picture of wild motherhood, fighting and ready to fight to the end if need be for its offspring.

Finally toward night she seemed to understand that the calf was dead and no longer of value to her, so, after driving Black Bruin far from the spot, she abandoned the fight and left him conqueror and in full possession of the field.

When he had made sure that she had returned to the pasture, he dragged the calf far up the mountainside into his fastness and gorged upon it as long as it lasted.

As the pasture in which Black Bruin had committed his depredation was a mile from the settler's house and not often visited except to salt the young stock kept in it, the real offender was not discovered, although it was apparent to the farmer that the heifer had been attacked by some wild beast. The rains, however, had so obliterated the signs that it is doubtful if he could have read them rightly, even had he discovered the scene of the battle.

About a week later Black Bruin was climbing the mountainside on the way to his fastness when the wind brought him a new scent that he had sometimes smelled before, but what to attribute it to he had never known. The scent was very strong and Black Bruin knew that the intruder of his domain was near at hand. At last he made out a dim gray shape, near the trunk of a tree. Its color so blended with its surroundings that he might not have noticed it at all, had it not been for two yellow phosphorus eyes that glowed full at him.

The creature was about the size of a large raccoon, but it was no raccoon. Its head was large and round, and surmounted by long ears with hairy tassels at the end. Its forearm was longer and stronger than that of a raccoon and the tail was short and not much of an ornament.

Whatever the animal was, it was small and possibly good to eat, so Black Bruin made a rush at it; but quick as he was, he was not half as quick as the lynx, which with a snarl and a spit scratched up the tree in a manner that made the bear's own accomplishments at tree-climbing look mean indeed. So the stranger could climb trees? Well, so could Black Bruin. Up he scratched after it. He would follow it to the top and then bat it off with his paw.

When the cat had nearly reached the top of the tree, it turned around and looked back. Its enemy was close upon it and something heroic must be done.

The cat measured the distance to a tree-top forty or fifty feet farther down the mountainside; then the top of the tree in which it squatted sprang back and the gray form shot through the air and alighted gracefully in the distant tree-top.

It was a great jump, and so astonished Black Bruin that he forgot to be furious at seeing his game escape.

This was his first experience with a Canadian lynx, but he saw them often, once he had learned their ways. He discovered that they too were fishermen, and hunters of small game. He often found them hunting upon his preserves, but their broad paws fell so lightly upon the forest carpet and their gray forms were so unobtrusive in the woods that he did not often come to close quarters with them.

A few days later, one evening, just at twilight, when Black Bruin was prowling cautiously after a deer family, consisting of a buck, two does, and three fawns, he made the acquaintance of another cat, much larger and more supple than the lynx.

The deer were moving slowly from point to point, browsing as they went, when suddenly from the tree-tops, fell a long lithe figure.

So swift and terrible was its coming that the doe upon whom it sprang was borne to the ground. The great cat did not wait for it to recover, but with claw and fang soon throttled it, while the rest of the herd fled at a breakneck pace, their white flags up.

Here was game already killed. The great cat was not over a third as heavy as Black Bruin. It would doubtless run away at his approach as did everything else.

So thought the bear as he rushed in to take the kill from the cougar, but he had reckoned without his host.

The panther was so intent upon its own game that it did not notice the approach of the bear until the rival hunter was within thirty feet of the prize. Then it wheeled about and was instantly transformed into a demon. Its tail lashed its sides, its fangs were bared in the ugliest snarl that Black Bruin had ever faced and its eyes fairly blazed.

Black Bruin backed off a few feet to get a better look at the terrible stranger. He had not expected opposition and such effrontery was new to him.

But the panther continued to lash her sides with her tail and to glare and snarl, so the bear circled about and about, trying to get behind his adversary. Finally, seeing that the panther had no notion of giving up the kill, the bear went in search of other game.

But he was not afraid of the great cat, only astonished and curious. He knew quite well that the deer did not belong to him and this may have kept him from picking a quarrel.

If he had met the cat in any of the forest highways and it had disputed his right to any of the privileges of the ancient woods, he would have given battle. So he was still the king of the mountain, although he had left the cat in full possession of the deer.

Spring and summer came and went. The blueberries ripened in the pastures and scant clearings, and the blackberries along the edge of the woods. All the native roots that Black Bruin knew so well grew in abundance.

Occasionally he stole from the distant settlements, as the king of the mountain had a right to do, or went farther into the wilderness where the hunting and fishing were better. Several times he ran across White Nose and her two fuzzy cubs, but they did not have much to do with each other until autumn came around.

Finally the first frosts came, and the waiting forest shook out its scarlet and crimson and golden banners, and many water-grasses and weeds took on quite bright colors, for such humble plants.

One moonlight night in October, when the air had begun to be clear and crisp, and the sky was so studded with stars that it seemed as if there was not room for even one more, a strange and lordly company came stalking into the land of the king of the mountain. They were gray, dim, spectral shapes and new to the region.

They may have been looking for feeding grounds, or perhaps the autumn restlessness was upon their leader, who was a giant of his kind,—a broad-antlered belligerent bull moose, ready at this season of the year to fight anything and everything that crossed his path.

The first time Black Bruin saw the newcomers he was digging roots along the edge of a shallow pond. He was also keeping a sharp lookout for frogs, clams, or almost any small crustaceans.

Presently he noticed a commotion out in the middle of the pond, which was only about an acre in extent. Then a great head, surmounted by a massive set of horns, came up out of the water and Black Bruin saw that the strange creature had his mouth full of lily-bulbs and water-grasses. Soon the huge head disappeared again, and after a few seconds reappeared, bringing up more lily-pads.

For half an hour Black Bruin watched the stranger diving and reappearing. Then the great beast swam ashore, shook himself and went crashing off through the woods, his hoofs keeping time in a rhythmic clack, a-clack, clack.

When he had disappeared Black Bruin advanced to the spot where he had come ashore and smelled his track. It was not like anything that he had ever smelled before, and somehow the scent made him angry. This lordly monster was invading his preserves. No one but him had a right to hunt or fish, or to eat roots in this region. So Black Bruin followed the trail of the moose, half curious and half angry.

He had not gone a quarter of a mile when he came up with the bull, who was rubbing his antlers upon the branches of a low tree.

Black Bruin watched him for several moments, until a puff of wind carried the telltale scent to the moose, who is most wary and watchful.

The moose threw up his head, gave a loud snort and blew his breath through his nose with a whistling sound, then crashed off through the forest. This fact led Black Bruin to surmise that he was afraid of him, and nearly resulted in his undoing.

The following day, he discovered the broad-antlered stranger browsing upon a small tree that was bent down under his foreleg. There were two other tall, gaunt creatures, also feeding near, and two small animals of the same kind. These were two cow-moose and their calves. Altogether it was quite an imposing family party.

Black Bruin watched them curiously for a time, until finally the bull scented him, and came charging through the bushes.

This both astonished and angered the bear, but seeing how large and formidable the stranger was, and how fearlessly he came on, Black Bruin sneaked away through the bushes into some very thick cover and bided his time.

It came a few days later. He was poking under the dead leaves for beechnuts, when he noticed the herd passing at a distance. The two cows and the calves were apparently alone, and one of the calves was straggling far behind the rest. For several days the blood-lust had been strong upon Black Bruin, and here was his opportunity. So he began stalking the calf warily. The wind was in his favor and in half an hour he had worked around within striking distance.

He first peered all about to see that the bull was not in sight, and then made a sudden rush upon the calf. But awkward as it looked, the calf was agile, and nearly eluded him, merely receiving a raking blow across the shoulder, where Black Bruin had intended to break its neck. Terrified and stung with excruciating pain, it ran hither and thither, bleating and making a great outcry.

But Black Bruin was not the hunter to let his prey get away if he could help it, so he pursued the calf hotly and soon landed another blow that stretched it upon the ground. He was so intent upon his own game, that he did not notice the cyclone bearing down upon him.

Suddenly the broad-antlered monster was above him, striking with terrible cutting hoofs, which ploughed deep furrows in his shaggy coat and cut deeper gashes. Almost before he knew it, he had been knocked down and was rapidly being trampled to death.

The only thing that protected him was his fat. He was so rotund and so covered with thick layers of fat, that he slipped about under the fearful cutting hoofs.

He struck out viciously, laying open one of the bull's forelegs, but without avail. In another minute his fate would have been sealed, had not a deliverer come at the right second.

Suddenly, from out the bushes near at hand, charged another bull moose, bellowing frightfully as he came. He was not coming primarily to Black Bruin's assistance, but to do battle with the first bull. One of the cows by right was his, and he proposed to claim his rights, and battle for them like the knights of old.

Hearing the challenge and seeing a rival near at hand, the moose left his victim and charged furiously at the newcomer, while Black Bruin limped painfully into the bushes, feeling that he had found out something about the genus moose that it was well to remember.

He did not fully recover from his mauling until he went into winter quarters.

The following spring when Black Bruin came forth from hibernation, he made a trip to a distant lake where the moose were often to be found. He had no mind to molest them, but he did want a certain root which grew only there.

He went directly to the little pond where he had first seen the bull moose, and had arrived within a few rods of the shore when his keen ear caught a slight sound. It was a sound of pain, half-groan and half-moan. Something was in distress. Distress in the wilderness usually means a good dinner for some one, so Black Bruin crept cautiously forward. Soon the wind brought moose-scent to the bear's nostrils and he was filled with fear and tempted to flee, but still he could hear deep groans and sighs. Coming to the edge of the water he peered out through the bushes and discovered the mighty moose helpless and impotent, mired in a treacherous spring bog. His legs were entirely buried in the mud, which came up on his sides. He was covered with foam and sweat, and so weak with thrashing and wrenching, that he could hardly hold up his great head.

At the sight, hate glowed hot in the small red eyes of Black Bruin. It was this monster who had so beaten and humiliated him. Now he would punish him, so he crept cautiously forward.

But the strong wind blew the moose-scent in his nostrils and fear kept him at bay. Finally the moose also scented the bear and made frantic efforts to free himself, feeling that he was now helpless and at the mercy of all; but his efforts were futile and he laid his head wearily down in the mud when he had ceased struggling.

For a whole day Black Bruin watched him, before he could overcome his fear; then he crept cautiously out and sprang upon the bull's rear. The great brute was by that time so spent that he hardly moved while Black Bruin lacerated his flanks. The only sign of pain that he gave was expressed in deep groans and sighs which seemed fairly to come from his breaking heart.

Soon the conqueror crept along the back to his neck, and biting and striking at the vertebrae, quickly extinguished the strong life in the great frame and the huge head gradually sank in the mire. For several days Black Bruin came and gorged himself upon the carcass and did not desist until it had entirely disappeared in the bog.



CHAPTER XIII

THE BEAR WITH A COLLAR

It may interest the reader to know just how Black Bruin looked in this, his seventh year, when he had acquired his full stature, which was enormous for a black bear.

The California grizzly occasionally reaches a thousand pounds, while the enormous brown Kadiak bears, the largest carnivorous animals in the world, reach two thousand pounds; but the black bear usually averages about two hundred. Black Bruin had far outstripped all his contemporaries in size and prowess. In the fall of his seventh year he weighed upon the scales four hundred and two pounds, which fairly earned him the title of King.

His coat was long, thick, and glossy and black in color.

He was not as high upon the shoulders as one might expect for so large a beast. A wolf that stands thirty or thirty-two inches at the shoulder will weigh one hundred and twenty-five pounds and is a large wolf. Black Bruin was probably thirty-five or forty inches high at the shoulder, but considerably higher in the middle of the back, which also sloped off at the rear, where he was quite rotund. His tail was so insignificant as to be hardly noticed at all at a distance. His head was rather small for so large an animal. His eyes were also small and looked weak. His claws, which were non-retractile, were not rakishly long as are the grizzly's, but protruded slightly beyond the long hair upon his feet.

So altogether Black Bruin was most imposing for an eastern bear. He was sleek and well-groomed, with the exception of two or three months in the early summer when he shed his coat.

Living as he now did within easy reach of the abode of man, he went more and more often to the farmhouses and took toll of the farmers. His wariness in regard to men, which he had learned partly of White Nose and partly from sad experience, gradually wore away and his old life with Pedro helped him to forget how strange and fearful a creature man is, when dealing with wild beasts.

So while he came and went much more recklessly than he would otherwise have done, yet his knowledge of man's ways stood him in good stead.

He knew that man was a creature of the day, doing his work in broad daylight, while the bear is a night prowler. He knew that at morning and evening man came and went from the fields to his den, where he always stayed at night.

He knew at just what hours the man-beast would be sleeping, and when he would come forth and tend his creatures. He had often followed his own master in the old cubhood days at the farmhouse, from outbuilding to outbuilding, watching him do the morning chores.

Man's thunder and lightning he also knew and feared more than all his other powers. Dogs he despised and he also hated them, for they often interrupted him in his thieving.

One Sunday morning early in June Black Bruin had been prowling about a little Canadian village and had satisfied his appetite with a hen-turkey, which he had happened to discover sitting far from home. He was returning to his mountain, when, in crossing one of those broad paths in which men always traveled, he so far forgot his usual precautions as nearly to run into a team carrying a half-witted French boy to early mass, that was being celebrated in the little French Catholic church near by.

Upon seeing the enormous black bear at such close quarters, the boy's hair fairly stood up with fright and whipping up his horse he was soon at the church. Throwing the lines upon the horse's back, he bolted into the sanctuary, although mass was in progress, crying, "I see one deevil bar, as beeg as a mountain, I deed."

Just as the boy entered the church, a large Newfoundland dog, which had followed one of the worshipers to mass and was waiting for his master upon the steps, like a good Catholic, became excited at the boy's frantic manner and bounded into the church after him.

Seeing the great shaggy dog appear at the same instant that the boy announced his "deevil bar," in the dimly lighted church, the worshipers at once jumped to the conclusion that this was the "deevil bar" who had come to eat them all up, like the wolf in "Red Riding Hood."

Women and children screamed and rushed for a farther corner of the church, while the more hysterical fainted. Even strong men were for a second startled.

But from his eminence at the altar Father Gaspard saw their mistake and soon reassured them.

Meanwhile, the innocent cause of all the disturbance had been as much scared by the team as had the half-witted boy by him, and was making for the deep woods at his best pace.

One night, early in July, Alec Pierre, a wood-chopper, came to the village with a startling story. He had been chopping two or three miles back in the heavy timber. His own home was closer to the primeval forest than any other of the many straggling farmhouses.

He had taken his dinner, going and coming at morning and evening. Each noon he went to a cool spring which he knew of, to eat his lunch.

This noon he had gone as usual, only to discover that some one had gotten ahead of him. There by the spring, sitting upon his haunches, was an enormous black bear. In his paws he was holding the coffee-bottle, looking at it intently, while his countenance plainly bespoke satisfaction with the discovery.

While the woodsman was wondering what was the best thing to do, the bear raised the bottle to his mouth, and biting upon the cork with his teeth, pulled it out. Then he put the nose of the bottle in his mouth and drank the contents with as much ease as if he had been the real owner.

"I so scart I jes' stan' there an' say nutting. He eat my doughnut, he eat my pie. He act jes' like folks. Pretty soon I keep on looking some more an' I see down in his har, round hees neck one peeg collar, jes' like a dog.

"Heem one beeg deevil. I so scart when he drink out uv de bottle, I no say nutting. He eat my pie, I no say nutting. I 'fraid he take my gun by the tree an' shoot me. By gar.

"By and by he go way and I go up an' look. Perhaps I t'ink I been dreaming. So I pinch my lage an' it hurt, an' then I look aroun' an' there bar-track beeg as snow-shoe.

"Eet so queer I t'ink heaps an' heaps. Then pretty soon I t'ink he some puddy tame bar run away. He break he chain. That why heem collar. I say to myself, no chain, no collar.

"Heem one tame bar run away. He know how do treeks. I catch heem in one small log-house I beeld. When circus come round next week, or two, I seel heem get pig money."

Those villagers who listened to Alec's tale agreed that his reasoning was good, but most of them characterized the story as one big lie, and thought no more of it. But not so Alec. He had seen that day in the wood the most wonderful sight of his life, a bear eating like folks, and he could not get out of his head the idea that the capture of that bear meant a fortune to the trapper who should accomplish the feat.

Perhaps, there was also some superstition linked with his curiosity, for nearly all Canucks are superstitious; but at any rate the very next day he set about building the trap that should capture the "deevil bar," and make him a rich man.

The trap upon which Alec relied for the capture of Black Bruin was a pen-trap. It was made in the following manner:

Alec looked about until he discovered four trees, growing in two pairs ten or twelve feet apart. These sets of pillars were to be the four corners of the trap. He then set to work to cut small logs eight or ten inches in diameter. These were a couple of feet longer than the pen was to be and were built up one above another on the inside of the pillars, being held in place against the trees by strong stakes driven deep into the ground.

In this manner the two sides and the back end of the pen-trap were formed. The top was covered with poles, weighted down with stones. The trap-door, which was at the front, was made of plank and slid up and down in a groove. When it was raised, it was held in place by a cord which passed over the top of the pen-trap and down on the back side, finally attaching to a trigger connecting with a spindle inside the pen, at the farther end. The bait was to be placed on this spindle and a tug upon it would let go the trap-door. As this was weighted with stones, it came down with a bang and anything unfortunate enough to be inside was caught in a prison of great strength.

It took Alec two days to build the trap, and when it was finished he carefully removed all chips and traces of his carpentering.

Usually a bear will not go near anything so new and apparently man-made as a green pen-trap. So Alec did not expect success for several days. In the meantime he took pains to bait Black Bruin and keep him in the vicinity by placing near the spring meat and other food, that his woodsman's instinct told him would be appreciated by a hungry bear. He did not forget an occasional bottle of coffee. Although he did not see the bear again for several days, yet the meat and the coffee always disappeared, which was pretty good evidence that he was near by.

Black Bruin heard Alec hacking and hewing at the trap, but did not consider it anything out of the ordinary. This queer creature was always hacking and hewing at the trees. He had often seen his handiwork piled up in long straight piles. Once for mere amusement he had scattered a pile in every direction.

When he at last came suddenly upon the pen-trap one day, after it had been baited for some time, he gave a surprised grunt and backed off a few feet to get a better view. It looked very queer and very suspicious. He was quite sure that it had not been there a week ago, for he was well acquainted with the region.

It was made of trees, but trees usually grew upright, and they always had limbs upon them. The ends of the logs were hacked and green like the sticks in the wood-pile.

Black Bruin circled around and around the pen-trap, gradually drawing nearer and nearer to it. Finally he came close enough to peep in at the doorway. Inside it was rather dark, but at last he both saw and smelled the calf's head that hung from the spindle. Meat had also been rubbed about the doorway, which was most tantalizing, especially as Black Bruin had not had any for three days.

He licked the particles of meat that still stuck to the logs about the doorway and then started to go in, but it seemed dark and suspicious; beside there was a very faint suggestion of man-scent inside. Outside the rain and the wind had obliterated all foreign scents. Man-scent meant danger. Man was no friend of the wild creatures, so Black Bruin backed out and very reluctantly went away.

When Alec visited his trap the next day, he did not go near enough to see the bear-tracks in the fresh dirt about the door, for he did not care to leave fresh man-scent in its vicinity; so he was rather discouraged with the failure of his efforts. The trap had now been set for a week and nothing apparently had been near it.

The next day Black Bruin again visited the trap, but his suspicions were still keen and as he had killed a wood-chuck that morning, his appetite was not ravenous, so he again left the bait untasted.

The third time that he came near the spot, which somehow had a fascination for him, he smelled a new and bewitching odor, one that a bear is almost powerless to resist. It brought back to his mind that old tantalizing picture of the row of white beehives in the back yard of the farmhouse.

The scent made his mouth drip saliva, and his manner, which a moment before had been suspicious and guarded, was now eager and full of curiosity and impatience.

He went at once to the doorway of the pen-trap and thrust in his head. It was as he had thought,—the ravishing scent came from inside.

He sniffed several times and with each whiff of the honey became more impatient. There, dangling from the spindle, was a section of the coveted sweet.

Black Bruin stepped inside and stretched out his muzzle toward the honey; then he detected a man-scent about the frame that he had not noticed before. He backed out and the hair rose on his neck.

He then smelled all about the sides of the pen. There was no suggestion of man-scent there. Again he returned to the honey.

The taint about that was certain, but the honey almost drove him frantic. So with a sudden motion he snatched the coveted prize in his mouth and gave a hard tug at it. He would seize it before the man-scent had power to injure him and then flee.

But quick as were the motions of Black Bruin, the trap was quicker, for the moment the trigger was loosed, the cord let go the drop-door and down it came with a great bang. The bear was suddenly in darkness.

With a loud "Uff" he dropped the honey and turned in the pen, but the doorway by which he had entered was closed. He sprang upon it with a growl and pushed with all his might, but he was pushing against the pillars, which were two trees nearly a foot in diameter, and he might as well have pushed against the side of a cliff.

Then he whirled about and, seizing the spindle in his mouth, pulled violently upon it, but it availed him nothing.

Then he assailed first one wall and then another in rapid succession. He tore the bark and also great pieces from the logs with his teeth, but the logs were thick and he merely strewed the inside of the trap with bark and splinters, leaving it still as strong as ever. Then he braced crosswise upon the trap and tried to push the logs from their places. They gave a very little when he put forth his giant strength, but the effort was futile.

Then he stood upon his hind legs and tried to reach the poles overhead with his paw, but the trap was too high for this.

For hours he raged and tore at the logs which held him so effectively. He stripped the inside of the pen entirely free of bark, and littered the floor with a bushel of splinters; but all his tearing and biting, pushing and straining, prying and growling, availed him nothing.

At last his great strength was worn out and in the place of rage at being restrained fear came over him. It was man that had done this thing. The scent on the honey-frame plainly said as much. He was again in the clutches of that dread creature.

Now his fear grew tenfold. The giant lay down in a corner, as far as possible away from the honey that had cost him his freedom, and cowered like a whipped dog, with his head between his paws and fear clutching him like an awful force that he was powerless to resist.

The following morning when Alec visited his trap, he found to his great joy that it was sprung. Going up cautiously, he peeped through a crack between the logs. There was the gigantic black bear cowering inside.

When Alec's eyes became accustomed to the gloom of the pen, he saw that the bear wore the heavy collar about his neck, although it was deeply imbedded in the fur, and at this assurance, Alec gave a shout of delight.

"Heem, my deevil bar, sure enough," he exclaimed, and at the hated man-sound Black Bruin drew farther into his corner.

That afternoon an ox-cart, bearing a mammoth crate made of two by four timbers, came creaking into the woods and was backed up to the pen-trap. For an hour or so there was a sound of hammering while a plank-covered gangway was being built from the pen-trap to the strong crate.

Then, to the great astonishment of Black Bruin, the door of the pen-trap slowly lifted, and the way to freedom seemed plain.

With a sudden rush he scrambled up the gang-plank into the crate, and a second trap-door, as strong as that in the pen-trap, closed behind him and he was a prisoner in a new house.

For a long time Black Bruin could not realize that he was still a prisoner. The light streamed in between the strong bars. He could see his captors all about him. They were three excited, gesticulating men, all dark, and to Black Bruin's eyes, sinister-looking like Pedro.

He put his paws between the bars and strained with all his might.

They pounded his paws and prodded him to make him desist, but he did not mind their blows any more than he would those of a child. Freedom was so near at hand. The green woods, the sweet wild woods, his woods were all about him. The blue sky was above him. The fragrant wind blew fresh through his prison-bars.

It could not be that he was helpless so near to freedom. Presently these strong bars would break and he would rush into the wilderness and flee far from the haunts of men.

Then the slow and curious procession started. One of the men drove the cattle and the other two walked by the side of the crate, prodding and beating Black Bruin whenever he strained too frantically at the prison-bars.

Slowly they drew out of the woods with its long dark shadows and its aroma of pine and balsam. Gradually the forest with its dells and its thickets, its ferns and witch-hazel, its bird-song and its chattering squirrels, its sense of freedom and peace, was left behind and they emerged into dusty roadways bordered by fields of grass and grain.

This was the habitat of man, his world, with which Black Bruin associated a chain and a collar, a sharp stick and curses and endless tricks.

At last he ceased to struggle and strain and stood with his head at the rear of his cage, looking back at his vanishing world. Slowly the green plumes of the forest faded. Even the outline of the distant mountains was at last lost and the flat farmlands, dotted with farmhouses and carpeted with grain-fields, took its place.

The old world and the old life were left far behind, and when the last blue hilltop faded, the heart went out of Black Bruin. He no longer exulted in his strength and his cunning, for man had again undone him.



CHAPTER XIV

THE WRECK

For weary hours the ox-cart plodded along the country road, and at last the long shadows deepened into twilight and the stars came out and it was night, but still they journeyed on.

The soft night-winds quickened into being the fragrance of many a flower that had not been noticed in the full heat of day. But wind and fragrance, night and daylight were all the same to Black Bruin, for that which made the world beautiful, and his strong free life worth living, was gone. Freedom was no longer his, and he cowered upon the floor of his prison, laid his head between his paws, and acted more like a whipped puppy than the great strong brute that he was.

Finally the ox-team drew up at a long, low building, and the men unloaded the crate upon a narrow platform.

Here they were soon joined by another man who came from the building.

"How long before the night freight ter H—— comes along, Bill?" drawled one of the men in charge of Black Bruin. "Alec, here, has got a bar as big as a cow that he is a-takin' to the circus which'll be at H—— to-morrow. He don't want to miss it."

"It's due now," replied the station-agent, and even as he spoke, the shrill whistle of the freight sounded in the distance.

A little later Black Bruin heard a distant rumbling and clanging which was like nothing that he had ever heard before. Then there was a vibration of the solid floor under him, and the long, heavily loaded freight thundered down upon the little station.

As the hideous, clanging, shrieking, hissing monster rushed down upon them, coming seemingly straight for the wooden crate, Black Bruin sprang against the bars with such violence that he nearly tipped it over, and gave his captors a great scare.

In a very few minutes, however, the crate, together with the other freight, was hustled into an empty car, and the train pulled out and went thundering away into the darkness.

At first the motion made Black Bruin very uneasy, and he walked to and fro continually; but finally this was succeeded by his being car-sick, and he was soon glad to lie down and keep very still for the rest of the journey.

This was his first night upon a freight train, but it was not his last, for ahead of him was a strange and turbulent existence. He was going to the great city to join the circus, to be a part of that astonishing procession which annually parades the streets of our large cities, and which draws crowds, such as does no other entertainment.

Toward morning, after having made several stops, the car in which Black Bruin was a passenger was side-tracked, and a large, gilded wagon, known to the small boy as a circus-van, was backed up to it. Then the crate was placed against the cage on the van, and both doors were opened.

The new prison looked much more fragile than that in which Black Bruin was. The bars were very small and might be easily broken. It was lighter, too, than his present abode, so after a little poking and punching, the captive went into the other prison, and a moment later, when he turned about to look for the doorway by which he had entered, it was closed and the wooden crate was being taken away. Man had again outwitted him, but the manner in which he was now confined seemed very insecure to Black Bruin. He would soon either find a way out, or else make one. With this in view, he went about the cage several times, sniffing and poking his nose between the bars. He put his powerful arms between two of the bars and strained upon them with all his enormous strength, but they did not seem to give at all. Then he sought to grind one to splinters between his teeth, but instead he broke a tooth, and the effort made him see stars.

What new and amazing substance was this, which could not be bent or broken, or even bitten into? The more Black Bruin pushed at the iron bars of his cage, the fainter grew that spark of hope which is the mainspring of all life, until at last he ceased to hope altogether, and bowing to the inevitable, no longer sought to be free. Sullenly he glared at the gaping crowds that passed his cage daily, and the only thing to which he looked forward was his food. This he received each day at about noon.

What it all meant, he could not imagine. The great crowds, the blare of bands, the gala dress and the babel of voices all reminded him of the country fairs that he had often attended with Pedro, in the old dancing-bear days.

The long journeys by rail he soon got used to, so that he was no longer sick, but it was a weary existence. The snap and rattle of car-wheels was continually in his ears, and if it was not that, it was the rattle and the rumble of heavy wheels over paving-stones, the noise of the brazen-throated circus-band, or the high and insistent calliope. Noise, noise, noise everywhere.

When the animals were fed, there was the roaring of the lions, the snapping and snarling of wolves, jaguars, pumas, and the hideous laugh of the hyena; the chattering of the monkeys, and the piping and croaking of strange, tropical birds. And, more insistent than any of these, the bellowing of the sacred cattle from India, and the belling and bleating of strange deer, not to mention the cavernous trumpeting of elephants when their keepers prodded them into obedience.

There is but one law in the circus, and that is the law of fear. All the wild beasts are ruled by it alone. The tricks that the great cats do are clubbed into them, and the elephants' ears are often so torn by the trainer's iron that they hang in ribbons.

It is only with the domestic animals, like the horses and the trick-dogs, that the trainer can exercise gentle persuasion. So in this great arena, this bedlam of wild beasts, were often heard the blows of club and lash, and the sharp report of pistols fired in the faces of unruly big cats.

How the two mammoth tents, covering many acres, and a dozen smaller ones came and went was a mystery to the general circus-goer. In the forenoon they went up like white mountains, and in the evening, almost before the last spectator had left his seat, they began to come down. Sometimes in half an hour after the last whistle had sounded, the tents and all the circus paraphernalia were packed in wagons and rumbling off to the depot. It was a life of hustle and bustle, jostle and push, here to-day, and a hundred miles away tomorrow.

The small boy, who was up before the first pale streak of light appeared in the east, and off to the freight-yards to see the four or five long circus trains come in, could have told you something about the marvelous way in which circus-men handle their strange caravan. There was always a crowd of these enterprising urchins standing wide-eyed and with gaping mouths, while the circus wonders were being unloaded.

They could have told you that the great gaudy vans were loaded on a train of flat cars, and that a single horse working a rope and pulley-block trundled the vans from the train nearly as fast as their respective teamsters could hitch horses to them and drive away. These boys knew that the stake and chain wagon was always the first to leave the train. Some of them usually fell in behind it and followed to the circus grounds, for it was good sport to see men with heavy sledge-hammers drive the many stakes and stretch the long chain which formed the perimeter of the mammoth tent, and behind which all the vans would ultimately take their places.

After the stake and chain wagon, came wagons bearing the cooking and dining tents, for breakfast is a most important matter when you have five hundred hungry people to feed. By nine o'clock the vast concourse were all on the circus ground, breakfast was over and preparations for the great parade were on foot. Nearly everything in the circus, with the exception of the side-shows, had to take part in the parade.

Only the small boy, who stands upon the pavement, holding to lamp-post or iron hitching-post to steady himself in the wild excitement, can tell you how his heart races and his blood leaps as the first gilded chariot swings around the corner into the main street. Thoughts of this moment have been in the boy's mind for weeks, and the realization is always greater than his anticipation. No matter if it is a small one-horse show, the hallucination of paint and tinsel, and gleam and glitter are there, and what a concourse it is! To get together this strange medley of men and women, beasts, birds and reptiles, the ends of the earth have been scoured. All Asia, from Siberia to India is there. Africa is represented from the Nile to Cape Town. The steppes of Russia and every out-of-the-way corner of Europe have been visited by the agents of the showman, and the result is legion. South America, with the wonders of the Amazon and the pampas and the high fauna of the Andes, is there. Our own continent also contributes largely, for the Rockies and the Selkirks still hold wonders for the eyes of youth. Even if we could contribute no wild beasts, there would still be ample reward for the boy in viewing our Indians, cow-punchers and real live scouts, such as our border-life alone can furnish.

It was as a feature of such a motley procession as this that Black Bruin's van was daily rattled over the paving-stones and finally took its place each day in the mammoth tent behind the chain, in readiness for the noon feeding. His van always followed that of a den of gray timber wolves and was in turn followed by the great white polar bear.