fighting, while the hens strutting
near, craning and chattering, probably some gossip about their fighting
swains, watched and were delighted with them. From the distance flowed
in a stern and deep roar, yet full of tenderness and love, the mating
call of the deer; while from the crags above came down the short and
broken voice of the mountain buck. Among the bushes frolicked the hares
and often near them a red fox lay flattened to the ground watching his
chance. I never heard any wolves and they are usually not found in the
Siberian regions covered with mountains and forest.

But there was another beast, who was my neighbor, and one of us had
to go away. One day, coming back from the hunt with a big heathcock, I
suddenly noticed among the trees a black, moving mass. I stopped and,
looking very attentively, saw a bear, digging away at an ant-hill.
Smelling me, he snorted violently, and very quickly shuffled away,
astonishing me with the speed of his clumsy gait. The following morning,
while still lying under my overcoat, I was attracted by a noise behind
my den. I peered out very carefully and discovered the bear. He stood on
his hind legs and was noisily sniffing, investigating the question as
to what living creature had adopted the custom of the bears of housing
during the winter under the trunks of fallen trees. I shouted and struck
my kettle with the ax. My early visitor made off with all his energy;
but his visit did not please me. It was very early in the spring that
this occurred and the bear should not yet have left his hibernating
place. He was the so-called "ant-eater," an abnormal type of bear
lacking in all the etiquette of the first families of the bear clan.

I knew that the "ant-eaters" were very irritable and audacious and
quickly I prepared myself for both the defence and the charge. My
preparations were short. I rubbed off the ends of five of my cartridges,
thus making dum-dums out of them, a sufficiently intelligible argument
for so unwelcome a guest. Putting on my coat I went to the place where
I had first met the bear and where there were many ant-hills. I made
a detour of the whole mountain, looked in all the ravines but nowhere
found my caller. Disappointed and tired, I was approaching my shelter
quite off my guard when I suddenly discovered the king of the forest
himself just coming out of my lowly dwelling and sniffing all around the
entrance to it. I shot. The bullet pierced his side. He roared