ity.

The bear crawled on. And now the stupor of death fell on the doomed man;
he saw the open jaws and bloodshot eyes coming, but in a mist.

As in a mist he heard a twang; he glanced down; Denys, white and silent
as death, was shooting up at the bear. The bear snarled at the twang.
but crawled on. Again the crossbow twanged, and the bear snarled, and
came nearer. Again the cross bow twanged; and the next moment the bear
was close upon Gerard, where he sat, with hair standing stiff on end and
eyes starting from their sockets, palsied. The bear opened her jaws like
a grave, and hot blood spouted from them upon Gerard as from a pump. The
bough rocked. The wounded monster was reeling; it clung, it stuck its
sickles of claws deep into the wood; it toppled, its claws held firm,
but its body rolled off, and the sudden shock to the branch shook Gerard
forward on his stomach with his face upon one of the bear's straining
paws. At this, by a convulsive effort, she raised her head up, up, till
he felt her hot fetid breath. Then huge teeth snapped together loudly
close below him in the air, with a last effort of baffled hate. The
ponderous carcass rent the claws out of the bough, then pounded the
earth with a tremendous thump. There was a shout of triumph below,
and the very next instant a cry of dismay, for Gerard had swooned, and
without an attempt to save himself, rolled headlong from the perilous
height.

CHAPTER XXV

Denys caught at Gerard, and somewhat checked his fall; but it may be
doubted whether this alone would have saved him from breaking his
neck, or a limb. His best friend now was the dying bear, on whose hairy
carcass his head and shoulders descended. Denys tore him off her. It was
needless. She panted still, and her limbs quivered, but a hare was not
so harmless; and soon she breathed her last; and the judicious Denys
propped Gerard up against her, being soft, and fanned him. He came to
by degrees, but confused, and feeling the bear around him, rolled away,
yelling.

"Courage," cried Denys, "le diable est mort."

"Is it dead? quite dead?" inquired Gerard from behind a tree; for his
courage was feverish, and the cold fit was on him just now, and had been
for some time.

"Behold," said Denys, and pulled the brute's ear playfully, and opened
her jaws and put in his head, with other insulting antics; in the midst
of which Gerard was violently sick.

Denys laughed at him.

"What is the matter now?" said