قراءة كتاب Bears I Have Met—and Others

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Bears I Have Met—and Others

Bears I Have Met—and Others

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was otherwise injured in his chest and body.

Further search revealed, near by, the dead body of their other missing comrade, seated on a bowlder by the side of a small stream with his head on his folded arms, which were supported by a shelf of rock in front of him. His whole under jaw had been bitten off and torn away, and a large pool of clotted blood at his feet showed that he had slowly bled to death after having been attacked and wounded by a bear. The ground showed evidences of a fearful struggle, being torn up and liberally sprinkled with blood for yards around.

The men carried Jabine to the nearest mining camp, whence others went to bring in the body of Broadus.

Jabine finally recovered, but he was shockingly disfigured for life. He afterwards told how he came upon the tracks of Broadus, and on reaching the spot where Broadus had received his death wound, he was suddenly attacked by a huge she-bear that was followed by two small cubs. The bear had evidently been severely wounded by Broadus and was in a terrible rage. She seized Jabine before he could turn to flee, and falling with her whole weight upon his body and chest, began biting his face. He soon lost consciousness from the pressure upon his chest, and remembered no more.

The poor fellow became a misanthrope, owing to his terrible disfigurement, and was finally found drowned in the river near Coloma.

In 1850 a number of miners were camped upon the spot where the little town of Todd's Valley now stands. Among them were three brothers named Gaylord, who had just arrived from Illinois. These young men used to help out the proceeds of their claim by an occasional hunt, taking their venison down to the river when killed, where a carcass was readily disposed of for two ounces.

One evening when the sun was about an hour high, one of the brothers took his rifle and went out upon the hills and did not return that night. The following morning his two brothers set out in search and soon found him dead, bitten through the spine in the neck, evidently by a bear. His rifle was unloaded and the tracks showed where he had fled, pursued by the angry animal, been overtaken, and killed.

On the succeeding day a hunt was organized and some twenty men turned out to seek revenge. The bears, for there were two of them, were tracked into a deep rocky canyon running from Forest Hill to Big Bar. Large rocks were rolled down its sides, and the bears were routed out and both killed.

In 1851, three men armed with Kentucky rifles, which were not only muzzle-loaders, but of small calibre and less effective than the ordinary .32 calibre rifle of to-day, were hunting deer on the divide between Volcano and Shirttail Canyons in Placer county. In the heavy timber on the slope they encountered a large Grizzly coming up out of Volcano Canyon. The bear was a hundred yards distant when they saw him and evinced no desire for trouble, and two of the hunters were more than willing to give him the trail and let him go about his business in peace. The other, a man named Wright, who had killed small bears, but knew nothing about the Grizzly, insisted on attacking, and prepared to shoot. The others assured him that a bullet from a Kentucky rifle at that distance would only provoke the bear to rush them, and begged him not to fire. But Wright laughed at them and pulled trigger with a bead on the bear's side, where even a heavy ball would be wasted.

The Grizzly reared upon his haunches, bit at the place where the ball stung him, and after waving his paws in the air two or three times, came directly for Wright with a fierce growl. The party all took to their heels and separated, but the bear soon overtook Wright and with one blow of his paw struck the man, face downward, upon the snow and began biting him about the head, back and arms. The other hunters, seeing the desperate case of their companion, rushed up and fired at the bear at close range, fortunately killing him with a bullet in the base of the brain.

Wright, on being relieved of the weight of his antagonist, sat up in a dazed condition, with the blood pouring in streams down his face. He had received several severe bites in the back and arms, but the worst wound was on the head, where the bear had struck him with his claws. His scalp was almost torn from his head, and a large piece of skull some three inches in diameter was broken out and lifted from the brain as cleanly as if done by the surgeon's trephine.

Strange to say, Wright complained of but little pain, excepting from a bite in the arm, and soon recovered his senses. His comrades replaced the mangled scalp, and bleeding soon ceased. A fire was built to keep him warm and while one watched with the wounded man the other returned to the trail to intercept a pack train. On the arrival of the mules, Wright was helped upon one of their backs, and rode unaided to the Baker ranch.

A surgeon was sent for from Greenwood Valley, who, on his arrival, removed the loose piece of bone from the skull and dressed the wounds. The membranes of the brain were uninjured, and the man quickly recovered, but of course had a dangerous hole in his skull that incapacitated him for work. One Sunday, some weeks afterward, the miners held a meeting, subscribed several hundred dollars and sent Wright home to his friends in Boston.

* * * * *

Mike Brannan was a miner on the Piru River in Southern California. The river, or creek, runs through a rough mountain district, and Brannan's claim was in the wildest part of it. He and his partner met a Grizzly on the trail, and Brannan had no better judgment than to fire his revolver at the bear instead of getting out of the way. The Grizzly charged, smashed the partner's skull with a blow and tumbled Brannan over a bank.

Brannan was stunned by the fall, and when consciousness returned he saw the bear standing across his body, watching him intently for signs of life. He tried to keep perfectly still and hold his breath, but the suspense was too great a strain and involuntarily he moved the fingers of his right hand. The bear did not see the movement, and when Brannan realized that his fingers had just touched his revolver, he conceived the desperate idea that he could reach the weapon and use it quickly enough to blow a hole through the bear's head and save himself from the attack which he felt he could not avert much longer by shamming.

To grasp the revolver it was necessary to stretch his arm full length, and he tried to do that slowly and imperceptibly, but his anxiety overcame his prudence and he made a movement that the watchful Grizzly detected. Instantly the bear pinned the arm with one paw, placed the other upon Brannan's breast and with his teeth tore out the biceps muscle. Brannan had the good luck to faint at that moment, and when his senses again returned he was alone. The Grizzly had watched him until satisfied that there was no more harm in him, and then left him.

Brannan managed to get to his cabin and eventually recovered, only to be murdered some years later for the gold dust he had stored away.

NOTE.—For many of the facts in this chapter of adventures with grizzlies in Placer and El Dorado counties in 1850 and 1851, I am indebted to Dr. R. F. Rooney, of Auburn, Cal., who obtained the details at first hand from pioneers.—A. K.





CHAPTER II.

THE STORY OF MONARCH.

Early in 1889, the editor of a San Francisco newspaper sent me out to catch a Grizzly. He wanted to present to the city a good specimen of the big California bear, partly because he believed the species was almost extinct, and mainly because the exploit would be unique in journalism and attract attention to his paper. Efforts to obtain a Grizzly by purchase and "fake" a story of his capture had proved fruitless for the sufficient reason that no captive Grizzly of the true California type could be found, and the enterprising journal was constrained to resort to the

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