hers, as they best could, choosing
their own.

The bear, a full-grown male, met the onset of the hounds with grim
confidence. The dogs encircled him with a ring of ferocious teeth,
running in from behind whenever they could to nip the huge beast in
the haunches or on the flank. But the surprise of the encounter was
Scuffy.

"Look," cried Bill Dancing, under whose wing Bucks had taken his post.
"Look at him! Why, the pup is a world-beater!"

In truth, Scuffy was the liveliest and most impudent dog in the pack,
and when the fight was fully on, managed to worry the angry bear more
than the hounds did. Within a moment the black hound, over-bold,
imprudently rushed the bear in front. A paw darting from the huge
beast caught him like a trip-hammer and stretched him helpless. In
that moment the bear exposed himself to Stanley's rifle and a shot
rang across the mountain-side. Scott watched the result anxiously. But
the slug instead of dropping the bear served only to enrage him. For
an instant the two hounds lost their heads and the infuriated bear
charged Bucks and Bill Dancing.

The shale opening became a scene of confusion. Exposing himself
recklessly, Scott tried to urge the dogs forward, but they had lost
their nerve. It needed only this to upset everything. The hunters
closed in together, and the critical moment had come; deaf alike to
command and entreaty, the two hounds refused to go in, and Scuffy,
flying wildly about the bear, seemed unable to check him. Dancing
stopped long enough to take one shot, and ran--with Bucks, who had
found no chance to shoot, following. The bear gained fast on the
long-legged lineman and his boy companion. A wash-out, hidden by a
clump of bushes, lay directly in the path of flight. Dancing,
perceiving it, dashed to the left and escaped. He shouted a warning to
Bucks, who, not understanding, plunged straight over the declivity
and sprawled into the wash-out with the bear after him. Catching his
rifle, the boy scrambled to his feet with his pursuer less than twenty
feet away. Between the two there was only open ground, and the bear
was scrambling for Bucks when Scuffy sprang down the shale bank and
confronted the enemy.

It looked like certain death for Scuffy, but the tramp dog did not
hesitate. He rushed at the bear with a fury of snapping, though not
without a lively respect for the sweep of the brute's fore paws. The
little dog, freeing himself forever in that moment from the stigm