fierceness of which he had heard so often spoken about by the old hunters. There it stood at last; but little did Dick Varley think that the first time he should meet with his foe should be when alone in the dark recesses of the Rocky Mountains, and with none to succour him in the event of the battle going against him. Yes, there was one. The faithful Crusoe stood by his side, with his hair bristling, all his formidable teeth exposed, and his eyes glaring in their sockets. Alas for poor Crusoe had he gone into that combat alone! One stroke of that monster’s paw would have hurled him dead upon the ground.
Chapter XVII.—The Fight With The Bear.
THERE is no animal in all the land so terrible and dangerous as the grizzly bear. Not only is he the largest of the species in America, but he is the fiercest, the strongest, and the most tenacious of life—facts which are so well understood that few of the western hunters like to meet him single-handed, unless they happen to be first-rate shots; and the Indians deem the encounter so dangerous that to wear a collar composed of the claws of a grizzly bear of his own killing is one of the highest honours to which a young warrior can attain.
The grizzly bear resembles the brown bear of Europe, but it is larger, and the hair is long, the points being of a paler shade. About the head there is a considerable mixture of grey hair, giving it the “grizzly” appearance from which it derives its name. The claws are dirty white, arched, and very long, and so strong that when the animal strikes with its paw they cut like a chisel. These claws are not embedded in the paw, as is the case with the cat, but always project far beyond the hair, thus giving to the foot a very ungainly appearance. They are not sufficiently curved to enable the grizzly bear to climb trees, like the black and brown bears; and this inability on their part is often the only hope of the pursued hunter, who, if he succeeds in ascending a tree, is safe, for the time at least, from the bear’s assaults. But “Caleb” is a patient creature, and will often wait at the foot of the tree for many hours for his victim.
The average length of his body is about nine feet, but he sometimes attains to a still larger growth. Caleb is
