gth enough left to straddle him. And
presently through the twilight shadows I caught a bright glimmer of our
camp-fire. Supper was ready; Takahashi grinned his concern away; all the
men were waiting for me; and like the Ancient Mariner I told my tale. As
I sat to a bountiful repast regaling myself, the talk of my companions
seemed absolutely satisfying.

George Haught, on a stand at the apex of the canyon, had heard and seen
a big brown bear climbing up through the thicket, and he had overshot
and missed. R.C. had espied a big black bear walking a slide some four
hundred yards down the canyon slope, and forgetting that he had a heavy
close-range shell in his rifle instead of one of high trajectory, he had
aimed accordingly, to undershoot half a foot and thus lose his
opportunity. Nielsen had been lost most of the day. It seemed everywhere
he heard yells and bays down in the canyon, and once he had heard a loud
rattling crash of a heavy bear tearing through the thicket. Edd told of
the fearful climb he and his father had made, how they had shot at the
grizzly a long way off, how funny another bear had rolled around in his
bed across the canyon. But the hounds got too tired to hold the trails
late in the day. And lastly Edd said: "When you an' Ben were smokin' the
grizzly I could hear the bullets hit close above us, an' I was sure
scared stiff for fear you'd roll him down on us. But father wasn't
scared. He said, 'let the old Jasper roll down! We'll assassinate him!'"

When the old bear hunter began to tell his part in the day's adventures
my pleasure was tinglingly keen and nothing was wanting on the moment
except that my boy Romer was not there to hear.

"Wal, shore it was an old bar day," said Haught, with quaint
satisfaction. His blue shirt, ragged and torn and black from brush,
surely attested to the truth of his words. "All told we seen five bars.
Two blacks, two browns an' the old Jasper. Some of them big fellars,
too. But we missed seein' the boss bar of this canyon. When Old Dan
opened up first off I wanted Edd to climb thet bluff. But Edd kept goin'
an' we lost our chance. Fer pretty soon we heard a bustin' of the brush.
My, but thet bar was rockin' her off. He knocked the brush like a wild
steer, an' he ran past us close--not a hundred yards. I never heard a
heavier bar. But we couldn't see him. Then Edd started up, an' thet
bluff was a wolf of a place. We was half up when I seen the grizzly thet
you an' Ben