An old hunter, named Ruhe, having set his traps to catch beavers,
returned to the stream to ascertain his success; he missed one of them,
and, on looking for it, saw signs of a bear having passed that way. As
he went on, he heard the noise of a heavy body breaking through the
bushes in the thicket. He hid himself behind a rock, and saw a huge
bear, limping on three legs to a flat piece of rock, upon which it
seated itself, and on raising one of its fore paws Ruhe discovered that
it was encircled by the lost trap. The bear lifted the iron glove
towards his face, examined it, turned his paw round and round, bent his
head from side to side, looked at the trap askance with the most
puzzled air, felt the encumbrance, tapped it on the rock, and evidently
knew not what to do. Then he began to feel pain and licked it; but Ruhe
soon put an end to all his conjectures, by shooting him dead.[3]

Of all bears, the grizzly is said to be the most formidable, both for
size and ferocity, and Mr. Ruxton tells the following anecdote, in which
one of them makes a conspicuous figure:--"A trapper, named Glass, and a
companion, were setting their beaver traps in a stream to the north of
the river Platte, when they saw a large, grizzly bear turning up the
turf near by, and searching for roots and pig-nuts. The two men crept to
the thicket, and fired at him; they wounded, but did not kill him; the
beast groaned, jumped all four legs from the ground, and, snorting with
pain and fury, charged towards the place from whence came the smoke of
the rifles. The men rushed through the thicket, where the underwood
almost impeded their progress; but the beast's weight and strength
carried him along so fast, that he soon came up with them. A steep bluff
was situated a hundred yards off, with a level plain of grass between it
and the thicket; the hunters flew across the latter with the utmost
speed, the bear after them. When he reached about halfway, Glass
stumbled over a stone and fell. He rose, and the bear stood before him
on his hind legs. Glass called to his companion to fire, and he himself
sent the contents of his pistol into the bear's body. The furious
animal, with the blood streaming from his nose and mouth, knocked the
pistol away with one paw, while he stuck the claws of the other into the
flesh of his antagonist, and rolled with him on the ground. Glass
managed to reach his knife, and plunged it several times into the bear,
while the latter, w