The halt was made at noon to give the horses a needed rest, for they had done considerable hard climbing. Even the peerless Whirlwind showed the effects of the unusual task. It being understood that the pause was to be for several hours, a general break-up of the company followed. The Blackfoot and the Shawanoe strolled off by themselves, and George and Victor Shelton took another direction, with a caution not to wander too far and to return before sunset.
The boys soon found themselves in a region where progress was difficult. They were not following any trail, and were forced at times to clamber over boulders and other obstructions, or to flank them; to descend into deep depressions and to climb ridges at whose summits they were obliged to sit down for a breathing spell. Such hard work made them thirsty, and when they came to one of the numerous tumbling brooks, whose waters were as clear as crystal and as cold as the snow and ice from which they sprang, they refreshed themselves with a deep draught and sat down for a rest.
“Whew!” sighed Victor, removing his cap and mopping his moist forehead; “there isn’t as much fun in this as I thought. I wouldn’t mind the walking and climbing if a fellow didn’t get tired.”
“And if you didn’t get tired you wouldn’t enjoy a rest like this.
“Do you remember,” he continued, “how Simon Kenton used to say at our house that no man could know what a good night’s sleep is unless he sat up one or two nights beforehand. I suppose there’s something in that, though we don’t have to try it on ourselves. I know that water doesn’t taste one-half so good unless you are as thirsty as you can be. It seems to me, Victor, that it’s time we bagged some game.
“We haven’t bagged much,” George added; “Mul-tal-la got an elk yesterday; Deerfoot brought down an antelope; I shot a turkey, and you came pretty near hitting a buffalo that was several yards off.”
“Came pretty near hitting him!” repeated Victor, with fine scorn. “I hit him fairly, and you know it, but these buffaloes have hard heads, like some persons I know.”
“Then you shouldn’t aim at their heads. Other people don’t, and it’s time you learned better.”
“I don’t know any relative of mine that is too old to learn a good many things,” replied Victor, without a spark of ill-nature.
“That sounds as if you mean me. I’ll own up that Deerfoot and I are liable to make mistakes now and then, but I don’t quite think either of us would run from a wounded antelope and keep up a yelling that could be heard a mile off.”
“It is sometimes a wise thing to run; you see it tempts your game to follow and brings him within range.”
“Where is the need of that when he must have been in range at the time you wounded him?”
“But couldn’t he turn and make off in another direction and get beyond reach before you could load again? I tell you, George, there was science in what I did. I advise you to try the same trick when you have a chance, and then”——
A peculiar hog-like grunt caused both to look behind them. The sight that met their gaze was enough to terrify a veteran hunter. Hardly a hundred feet away stood the most gigantic grizzly bear of which they had ever dreamed. They had listened spellbound to the story of Mul-tal-la, but believed that the panic he underwent at the time of his encounter with one of those western terrors caused him to exaggerate his account, though it must have been a fearful brute that could have wrought the havoc he did.
A Western Monarch.
This bear had his hind feet on the ground and his front ones on a boulder, so that his massive back sloped downward from his head, and he was looking at the boys as if speculating as to what species they belonged. His size was tremendous. To the lads he seemed to be three or four times the bulk of any of his kind they had met in the forests of Ohio or Kentucky. It is not improbable that the estimate of the brothers was right. You know that the grizzly bear (which the early explorers referred to as a white bear) is now, as he has been from time immemorial, the monarch of the western wilds. So prodigious are his size and strength that he is absolutely without fear.
And he is justified in this self-confidence. One stroke of that mighty paw, whose claws are often six inches in length, will break the back of a horse or tear a man to shreds, and enveloping his victim in those beam-like front legs, he will crush him to pulp without putting forth more than a tithe of his power. A score of bullets have been pumped into that immense carcass without causing any apparent harm. The Rocky Mountain grizzly saves the hunter the trouble of attacking him. It is the bear himself who starts things moving and keeps them going at a lively rate. The advice of the most experienced ranger of the wilds is that if a man is alone and without an inaccessible perch from which to shoot, he should not disturb the grizzly. This advice is equally good for two persons, and would not be inappropriate for three in most circumstances.
It may be doubted whether the entire West at the time of which I am writing contained a more colossal grizzly bear than the one upon which George and Victor Shelton gazed when they turned their heads. His bulk was so immense that they recognized him on the instant as the dreaded brute of which they had heard more than one terrifying story.
Why he did not advance upon the lads at once is not easy to explain. It probably was because the whim did not come to him, or he may have looked upon the couple as too insignificant for notice. It is not unlikely that curiosity had something to do with it, for no doubt they were the first examples of the Caucasian race that he had seen, though he must have met Indians and may have crushed an indefinite number to death.
The strange spectacle was presented for the next few minutes of the boys staring at the monster, while he stared back at them, no one moving or making any sound. George and Victor were literally paralyzed for the time and unable to stir or speak.
Victor was the first to rally. Forgetting the warnings of Deerfoot and Mul-tal-la, he sprang to his feet, faced wholly around, and brought his gun to his shoulder.
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CHAPTER XXII A CHANGE OF PLAN.
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CHAPTER XXIV A MEMORABLE ENCOUNTER.
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