der the circumstances. A clean handkerchief, which Ivan chanced to
have, served as a covering for the scar; and this being tied on
securely, with a strip torn from the sleeve of Pouchskin's own shirt,
left the wounded guardsman in a condition to recover, as soon as it
might please nature to permit. Nothing more could have been done by the
most "skilful practitioner."

Their next business was to look after the bear. On going back to the
hole, and, gazing into it, the animal, as Alexis had anticipated, was
quite dead; and the water, partially dammed up by the huge carcass, was
flowing over it.

Ivan, who had hitherto done least of all to secure the prize, now became
the most active of the three; and, leaping down upon the body of the
great brute, he looped the rope around one of its hind legs, and then
stood on one side to help the rest in raising it upward.

Alexis and Pouchskin commenced hauling on the other end of the rope, and
the vast mass slowly ascended upward, Ivan pushing from below, and
guiding it past the inequalities of the snow. It would have been a
different sort of a task, to have hauled Bruin out of such a hole three
months earlier in the season; that is, about the time he had lain down
for his winter _siesta_. Then he would have turned six or seven hundred
pounds upon the scales, whereas at this time he was not more than half
the weight. His skin, however, was in just as good condition as if he
had been fat; and it was this, and not his carcass, that our hunters
cared for.

After some tough pulling, accompanied by a good deal of shouting from
Ivan at the bottom of the hole, the huge carcass was dragged forth, and
lay at full length along the frozen snow. It was still necessary to
raise it to the branch of a tree, in order that it might be skinned in a
proper manner. This however, could be easily accomplished by means of
the rope.

Up to this time Pouchskin had been puzzled about the loss of his knife.
Everywhere he looked for it; but it was nowhere to be found. All the
surface _over_ which he had danced with the bear was carefully examined,
and the snow scraped up to the depth of several inches. There was the
blood of the bear, and some of Pouchskin's own too, but no knife! Could
it have got into the water? No. Pouchskin declared that he had dropped
it near the edge of the snow-bed: for this accident, as already stated,
had been the cause of his retreat from the conflict.

It was only