necessary to a trapper's life, and soon became the
rendezvous of all the adventurous men from the banks of the river Platte
to the shores of the Great Salt Lake.

Since Boone had settled in his present abode, he had had a hand-to-hand
fight with a black bear, in the very room where we were sitting. When he
had built his log cabin, it was with the intention of taking to himself
a wife. At that time he courted the daughter of one of the old Arkansas
settlers, and he wished to have "a place and a crop on foot" before he
married. The girl was killed by the fall of a tree, and Boone, in his
sorrow, sent away the men whom he had hired to help him in "turning his
field," for he wished to be alone.

Months elapsed, and his crop of corn promised an abundant harvest; but
he cared not. He would take his rifle and remain sometimes for a month
in the woods, brooding over his loss. The season was far advanced, when,
one day returning home, he perceived that the bears, the squirrels, and
the deer had made rather free with the golden ears of his corn. The
remainder he resolved to save for the use of his horse, and as he
wished to begin harvest next morning, he slept that night in the cabin,
on his solitary pallet. The heat was intense, and, as usual in these
countries during summer, he had left his door wide open.

It was about midnight, when he heard something tumbling in the room; he
rose in a moment, and, hearing a short and heavy breathing, he asked who
it was, for the darkness was such, that he could not see two yards
before him. No answer being given, except a kind of half-smothered
grunt, he advanced, and, putting out his hand, he seized the shaggy coat
of a bear. Surprise rendered him motionless, and the animal giving him a
blow in the chest with his terrible paw, threw him down outside the
door. Boone could have escaped, but, maddened with the pain of his fall,
he only thought of vengeance, and, seizing his knife and tomahawk, which
were fortunately within his reach, he darted furiously at the beast,
dealing blows at random. Great as was his strength, his tomahawk could
not penetrate through the thick coat of the animal, which, having
encircled the body of his assailant with his paws, was pressing him in
one of those deadly embraces which could only have been resisted by a
giant like Boone. Fortunately, the black bear, unlike the grizzly, very
seldom uses his claws and teeth in fighting, contenting himself with
smothering hi