a party of practical hunters, who, with the true California instinct, scouted the entire statement as "too thin," affirmed that there never was a bear seen within ten miles of there, hinted that he had been frightened by a drove of cattle, winding up with an intimation that he had doubtless been drinking a little too freely of late, and if he did not want to have an attack of the "jim-jams" he had better switch off right then and there, turn over a new leaf, and reform his vicious not to say criminal habits at once and forever. Adding insult to injury was literally boiled down in this case, and our hero of "the three bars," as he was derisively termed, went to his bed that night in a frame of mind easier to be imagined than described. Next morning a small Spanish boy—who had been posted in advance by the party—rode out on a mustang to the scene of our hero's misadventure, brought back his gun, which was found lying on the ground just where he had left it, and on being closely questioned as to the "sign" he had seen, swore by all the saints in the calendar that there was nothing there save a few fresh hoe tracks. This last straw broke the camel's back, and our Nimrod packed his traps and started for San Francisco by the morning stage, cursing in the bitterness of his heart the whole human race, and devoutly praying that the bears which the hunters affected to disbelieve in the very existence of might catch and devour them all. It is but just to add that the bears were there, and the hunters knew it all the time. They only wanted their little joke. Everything had occurred just as he had stated it, and in
