ing down through the brush on his side, expecting to
find me under the fallen tree. Before he knew what had happened I was
shooting him full of holes and he was dead in a minute.

"When I examined the dead Grizzly I found the most singular thing I
ever came across. In the sole of his right forepaw was an
ivory-handled bowie-knife, firmly imbedded and partly surrounded by
calloused gristle as hard as bone. The handle was out of sight, but
the butt of it made a knob in the heel of the bear's foot and left a
mark on the ground. Evidently he walked on that heel to keep the blade
from striking stones and getting dulled. That knife accounted for all
the mysteries about the white-headed Grizzly.

"What's that? Mystery about how the knife got into his foot? Not at
all; that's simple enough. He swallowed the knife during some fight or
other, and it worked around in his system and down into his foot just
as a needle does in a man."

CHAPTER XIII.

SMOKED OUT.

What a bear may do under given circumstances may be guessed with
reasonable certainty by one who has had experience, but it is not
always safe to risk much on the accuracy of the guess. Bruin's general
nature is not to be depended upon in special cases. He has individual
characteristics and eccentricities and is subject to freaks, and these
variations from the line of conduct which he is expected to follow are
what makes most of the trouble for people who are after his pelt.
Morgan Clark, the old bear hunter of Siskiyou, never hesitates about
going into a den in the winter to drive out a bear, provided the cavern
is wide enough to let the bear pass him. He takes a torch in his hand
and stalks boldly in, because his experience has made the proceeding
seem perfectly safe.

"All you've got to do," says Morgan, "is to stand to one side and keep
quiet, and the bear'll just scoot by without noticing you. It's the
light that's bothering him, and all he's thinking about is getting out
of that hole as fast as he can. He don't like the smoke and the fire,
and he won't pay any attention to anything else until he gets outside,
but then you want to look out. He goes for the first live thing in
sight when he's clear of the cave and the smudge, and he don't go very
slow either. Jim Brackett found that out over in Squaw Valley one day.
He found a bear in a den, and built a fire at the mouth to smoke him
out. The fire was burning rather slowly, Brackett thought,