er animal
and he would devour it, too. As to the fighting of cougars and
grizzlies, that was a mooted question, with the credit on the side of
the former.

The story of the doings of cougars, as told in the snow, was intensely
fascinating and tragic! How they stalked deer and elk, crept to within
springing distance, then crouched flat to leap, was as easy to read as
if it had been told in print. The leaps and bounds were beyond belief.
The longest leap on a level measured eighteen and one-half feet. Jones
trailed a half-grown cougar, which in turn was trailing a big elk. He
found where the cougar had struck his game, had clung for many rods, to
be dashed off by the low limb of a spruce tree. The imprint of the body
of the cougar was a foot deep in the snow; blood and tufts of hair
covered the place. But there was no sign of the cougar renewing the
chase.

In rare cases cougars would refuse to run, or take to trees. One day
Jones followed the hounds, eight in number, to come on a huge Tom
holding the whole pack at bay. He walked to and fro, lashing his tail
from side to side, and when Jones dashed up, he coolly climbed a tree.
Jones shot the cougar, which, in falling, struck one of the hounds,
crippling him. This hound would never approach a tree after this
incident, believing probably that the cougar had sprung upon him.

Usually the hounds chased their quarry into a tree long before Jones
rode up. It was always desirable to kill the animal with the first
shot. If the cougar was wounded, and fell or jumped among the dogs,
there was sure to be a terrible fight, and the best dogs always
received serious injuries, if they were not killed outright. The lion
would seize a hound, pull him close, and bite him in the brain.

Jones asserted that a cougar would usually run from a hunter, but that
this feature was not to be relied upon. And a wounded cougar was as
dangerous as a tiger. In his hunts Jones carried a shotgun, and shells
loaded with ball for the cougar, and others loaded with fine shot for
the hounds. One day, about ten miles from the camp, the hounds took a
trail and ran rapidly, as there were only a few inches of snow. Jones
found a large lion had taken refuge in a tree that had fallen against
another, and aiming at the shoulder of the beast, he fired both
barrels. The cougar made no sign he had been hit. Jones reloaded and
fired at the head. The old fellow growled fiercely, turned in the tree
and walked down h