36 THE ELSON READERS BOOK VII (7th Grade) walking slowly off with his head down. He was quartering to me, and I fired into his flank, the bullet, as I afterwards found, ranging forward and piercing one lung. At the shot he uttered a loud, moaning grunt and plunged forward at a heavy gallop, 5 while I raced obliquely down the hill to cut him off. After going a few hundred feet he reached a laurel thicket, some thirty yards broad, and two or three times as long, which he did not leave. I ran up to the edge and there halted, not liking to venture into the mass of twisted, close-growing stems and glossy foliage. More10 over, as I halted, I heard him utter a peculiar, savage kind of whine from the heart of the brush. Accordingly, I began to skirt the edge, standing on tiptoe and gazing earnestly to see if I could not catch a glimpse of his hide. When I was at the narrowest part of the thicket, he suddenly left it directly opposite, and then 15 wheeled and stood broadside to me on the hillside, a little above. He turned his head stiffly toward me; scarlet strings of froth hung from his lips; his eyes burned like embers in the gloom. I held true, aiming behind the shoulder, and my bullet shattered the point or lower end of his heart, taking out a big nick. 20 Instantly the great bear turned with a harsh roar of fury and challenge, blowing the bloody foam from his mouth, so that I saw the gleam of his white fangs; and then he charged straight at me, crashing and bounding through the laurel bushes, so that it was hard to aim. I waited until he came to a fallen tree, raking him 25 as he topped it with a ball which entered his chest and went through the cavity of his body, but he neither swerved nor flinched, and at the moment I did not know that I had struck him. He came steadily on, and in another second was almost upon me. I fired for his forehead, but my bullet went low, enter30 ing his open mouth, smashing his lower jaw and going into the neck. I leaped to one side almost as I pulled trigger; and through the hanging smoke the first thing I saw was his paw as he made a vicious side blow at me. The rush of his charge carried him past. As he struck he lurched forward, leaving a pool of bright 85 blood where his muzzle hit the ground; but he recovered himself and made two or three jumps onward, while I hurriedly jammed a couple of cartridges into the magazine, my rifle holding only four, all of which I had fired. Then he tried to pull up, but as he did so his muscles seemed suddenly to give way, his head drooped, and he rolled over and over like a shot rabbit. Each of my first three bullets had inflicted a mortal wound. It was already twilight, and I merely opened the carcass, and hen trotted back to camp. Next morning I returned and with much labor took off the skin. The fur was very fine, the animal being in excellent trim, and unusually bright-colored. Unfortuately, in packing it out I lost the skull, and had to supply its lace with one of plaster. The beauty of the trophy, and the memory of the circumstances under which I procured it, make he value it perhaps more highly than any other in my house. This is the only instance in which I have been regularly harged by a grizzly. On the whole, the danger of hunting these X eat bears has been much exaggerated. At the beginning of the esent century, when white hunters first encountered the grizzly, I was doubtless an exceedingly savage beast, prone to attack thout provocation, and a redoubtable foe to persons armed th the clumsy, small-bore, muzzle-loading rifles of the day. it at present, bitter experience has taught him caution. He has en hunted for sport, and hunted for his pelt, and hunted for bounty, and hunted as a dangerous enemy to stock, until, save the very wildest districts, he has learned to be more wary than leer, and to avoid man's presence almost as carefully as the st timid kind of game. Except in rare cases he will not attack is own accord, and, as a rule, even when wounded, his object scape rather than battle. till, when fairly brought to bay, or when moved by a sudden of ungovernable anger, the grizzly is beyond peradventure a dangerous antagonist. The first shot, if taken at a bear a I distance off and previously unwounded and unharried, is not lly fraught with much danger, the startled animal being at outset bent merely on flight. It is always hazardous, how ever, to track a wounded and worried grizzly into thick cover, and the man who habitually follows and kills this chief of American game in dense timber, never abandoning the bloody trail whithersoever it leads, must show no small degree of skill and 6 hardihood and must not too closely count the risk to life or limb. Bears differ widely in temper, and occasionally one may be found which will not show fight, no matter how much he is bullied; but, as a rule, a hunter must be cautious in meddling with a wounded animal which has retreated into a dense thicket, and has been 10 once or twice roused; and such a beast, when it does turn, will usually charge again and again, and fight to the last with unconquerable ferocity. The short distance at which the bear can be seen through the underbrush, the fury of its charge, and its tenacity of life make it necessary for the hunter on such occa15 sions to have steady nerves and a fairly quick and accurate aim. It is always well to have two men in following a wounded bear under such conditions. This is not necessary, however, and a good hunter, rather than lose his quarry, will, under ordinary circumstances, follow and attack it, no matter how tangled the fast20 ness in which it has sought refuge; but he must act warily and with the utmost caution and resolution, if he wishes to escape a terrible and probably fatal mauling. An experienced hunter is rarely rash, and never heedless; he will not, when alone, follow a wounded bear into a thicket, if by the exercise of patience, skill, 25 and knowledge of the game's habits he can avoid the necessity; but it is idle to talk of the feat as something which ought in no case to be attempted. While danger ought never to be needlessly incurred, it is yet true that the keenest zest in sport comes from its presence, and from the consequent exercise of the qualities 30 necessary to overcome it. The most thrilling moments of an American hunter's life are those in which, with every sense on the alert, and with nerves strung to the highest point, he is following alone into the heart of its forest fastness the fresh and bloody footprints of an angered grizzly; and no other triumph of $5 American hunting can compare with the victory to be thus gained. NOTES AND QUESTIONS Biography. Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919), twenty-sixth President of the United States, was born in New York City. As a boy he was of frail physique, but overcame this handicap by systematic exercise and outdoor life. He was always interested in natural history, and at the age of fourteen, when he accompanied his father on a tour up the Nile, he made a collection of the Egyptian birds found there. This collection is now in the Smithsonian Museum, Washington, D. C. In 1884 Roosevelt bought two cattle ranches in North Dakota, where for two years he lived and entered actively into western life and spirit. In 1909, at the close of his presidency, he conducted an expedition to Africa, to make a collection of tropical animals and plants. Expert naturalists accompanied the party, which remained in the wilderness for a year, and returned with a collection which scientists pronounce of unusual value for students of natural history. Most of the specimens are now in the Smithsonian Museum. Some of the books in which he has recorded his hunting experiences are: African Game Trails, The Deer Family, and The Wilderness Hunter, from which "Hunting the Grizzly Bear" is taken. The vigorous personality of this great American continually found expression not only in his interest in the lives of men and their political and social relations, but also in his love of the great outdoors and the unbeaten tracks where life is an adventure. Roosevelt's last work as an explorer was his journey to South America. On this journey he penetrated wildernesses rarely explored by white men, and made many discoveries in the field of South American animal and vegetable life and in geography. Discussion. 1. Locate the region in which the author was hunting at the time of the adventure he narrates. 2. Describe his outfit and tell what must be considered in providing such a hunting outfit. 3. What moments in the encounter with the grizzly were most exciting and dangerous? 4. For what purpose does the author say the grizzly has been hunted? 5. What habit has bitter experience taught the grizzly bear? 6. What shows you that Roosevelt was a close observer of Nature? 7. What qualities must a hunter of the grizzly bear possess? 8. What conclusions does the author give as a result of his experience in hunting "this chief of American game"? 9. What impression of the author do you gain from this story? 10. On page 19 you were told that Nature sometimes gives us two kinds of adventures; which kind is told of in this story? 11. You will enjoy reading The Boys' Life of Theodore 40 THE ELSON READERS BOOK VII (7th Grade) Roosevelt, Hagedorn, and “Blackbear," Scoville (in St. Nicholas, August, 1919). 12. Find in the Glossary the meaning of emergency; coulie; trophy; prone; provocation; redoubtable; pelt; quarry; fastness. 13. Pronounce: obliquely; foliage; wound; wary. crabbedly honest, 34, 8 stock saddle, 34, 30 packing cinch, 35, 2 caught the loom, 35, 34 quartering to me, 36, 1 packing it out, 37, 11 Phrases for Study hunted for the bounty, 37, 23 Questions for Testing Silent Reading. 1. Where did Roosevelt spend the fall of 1889? 2. What can you tell about his companion? 3. Of what Idid Roosevelt's outfit consist? 4. Describe the place he chose for his camp. 5. What was his object in leaving the camp? 6. Tell of his stroll. 7. What were the actions of the bear after the first shot? 8. Give an account of the bear's charge. 9. Why is the grizzly not so dangerous now as he once was? 10. What is the chief danger in hunting these great bears? Outline for Testing Silent Reading. (a) The part of the country in which the hunt occurred; (b) Roosevelt's outfit and camp; (c) His discovery of the bear; (d) The encounter with the bear; (e) The danger in hunting the grizzly. Silent and Oral Reading Silent Reading. This book includes abundant material for both silent and oral reading. Some stories and poems must be read thoughtfully in order to gain the author's full meaning; such reading cannot be done rapidly. In other selections the meaning can be grasped easily, and the reading can be rapid; in such cases we read mainly for the central thought, for the story-element. You read silently more often than you read aloud to others; you should, therefore, train yourself in rapid silent reading, concentrating your mind on the thought of the selection. You will soon discover that as you give closer attention to a story you will not only understand it |