being ajar, he nosed it open and
entered. The damp, cheerless interior, with no furnishing but a rusty
stove, a long bench hewn from a log, and a tier of bunks along one side,
disheartened him. The smell of human occupation still lingered about the
bunks, but all else savoured of desertion and decay. With drooping head
he emerged, and crossed over to the log stable. That horses had occupied
it once, though not recently, was plain to him through various
unmistakable signs; but it was more in the hope of sniffing the scent of
his own kind than from any expectation of finding the stable occupied
that he poked his nose in through the open doorway.

It was no scent of horses, however, which now greeted his startled
nostrils. It was a scent quite unfamiliar to him, but one which,
nevertheless, filled him with instinctive apprehension. At the first
whiff of it he started back. Then, impelled by his curiosity, he again
looked in, peering into the gloom. The next instant he was aware of a
huge black shape leaping straight at him. Springing back with a loud
snort, he wheeled like lightning, and lashed out madly with his heels.

The bear caught the blow full in the ribs, and staggered against the
door-post with a loud, grunting cough, while the stallion trotted off
some twenty yards across the chips and paused, wondering. The blow, in
all probability, had broken several of the bear's ribs, but without
greatly impairing his capacity for a fight; and now, in a blind rage, he
rushed again upon the intruder who had dealt him so rude a buffet. The
stallion, however, was in no fighting mood. Depressed as he was by the
desolation of the cabin, and daunted by the mysterious character of this
attack from the dark of the stable, he was now like a child frightened
of ghosts. Not the bear alone, but the whole place, terrified him. Away
he went at full gallop across the clearing, by good fortune struck the
continuation of the loggers' road, and plunged onward into the shadowy
forest.

For a couple of miles he ran, then he slowed down to a trot, and at last
dropped into a leisurely walk. This trail was much broader and clearer
than the one which had led him to the camp, and a short, sweet grass
grew along it, so that he pastured comfortably without much loss of
time. The spirit of his quest, however, was now so strong upon him that
he would not rest after feeding. Mile after mile he pressed on, till the
sun was high in the clear, blue heaven