A BIG BEAR HIDE
The next morning while the party were cooking and eating breakfast, a
swarm of mosquitoes settled upon the camp in great numbers. Not only did
they trouble the men, but the horses were greatly annoyed by them; so
much as that they stopped feeding and began to wander off, seeking the
thickets of quaking aspen and willow, through which they walked in order
to brush off the insects. Besides the mosquitoes, the green head
flies--bulldogs, Hugh called them--were very troublesome. Before
breakfast was over Hugh said, “Look here, boys, we can’t stay here. The
flies are too bad. We must pack up and go on and get somewhere higher
up, or else to a place where the wind is blowing. Unless we do that we
are likely to lose our horses. They’ll run away on us.”
“Yes,” said Jack, “we’ve either got to get high up on the hills or else
go out on the prairie. Here the flies are too bad.”
“Well,” said Hugh, “you two boys build two or three small fires and
throw some grass or wet bark on them so as to make plenty of smoke, and
then go out and round up the horses and bring them in, so that they can
stand in the smoke. Then we’ll cache the wagon here in the brush
somewhere, and pack up and go on up the river and see if we can’t find
some place where the flies are not so thick.”
It took the boys but a short time to build a line of small fires at
right angles to the lake, down which a gentle breeze was blowing, and
then, pulling some green grass and stripping the wet bark off an old
rotting cottonwood log, they soon had a line of smokes too strong for
any insect. Then, going a little way down the lake, they found the
horses and drove them back to leeward of the fire, where they stopped in
apparently great contentment, with only their heads visible above the
smoke.
Meanwhile Hugh had been unloading the wagon, getting out the pack
saddles with their riggings and making up the packs. A portion of the
provisions he left in the wagon, but the flour and the bacon he tied
with extra ropes and, when the boys had finished with the horses, he had
one of them climb into a tree and hang the food where it could not be
reached by mice or ground squirrels. The sheep meat was lowered and
found to be perfectly good and so dried on the outside that the flies
would not trouble it. It was put in an old flour sack to go on one of
the packs.
Long before noon matters were so far advanced that the horses were
saddled and, after three of the animals had been packed and led back
again into the smoke, the three riding horses were saddled, and
presently the little train set off up the lake over the trail followed
by Jack and Joe the day before. While they were crossing the inlet, and
for the first mile or two up the trail on the other side of the upper
lake, the flies were very bad, but presently, when they emerged from the
growth of young quaking aspens they met a strong breeze blowing down the
lake, which made things better.
Hugh had sent Jack ahead, telling him to follow the trail that led up
the lake to an old Indian camping ground six or seven miles above the
outlet. The trail was plain and it was impossible to lose it, and Jack
plodded along fighting mosquitoes and watching the splendid mountains
which rose on either side of the lake. As he passed over a little ridge
between two of the many streams that ran down from the mountains, he
suddenly saw ahead of him and a little to his right, a huge brown bear,
apparently looking not at him, but at something behind him on the trail.
The bear stood on the hillside at a little distance above the trail, and
a rise of the ground had hidden Jack from view. It was a
splendid-looking animal, its coat bright and glossy, and Jack could see
the long fur ripple as the breeze struck it.
All this Jack’s eye took in at a glance, and instantly he had slipped
out of his saddle and stepped around his horse’s head, holding the reins
over his left arm. He pitched his gun to his shoulder, aimed at the bear
just behind the foreleg and low down and fired. Then, turning, he sprang
into his seat almost without touching the saddle.
At the shot the horse had stepped quickly to one side, but had not
pulled back, so that Jack had no trouble in remounting, while the bear
had given a loud bawl, and had fallen to the ground, turning its head to
bite the wound, and then had rolled over two or three times down the
steep hillside.
Jack whirled his horse and spurred up the hill, wishing to be above the
bear rather than below it. At the same time he waved his arm to Hugh,
who was now in sight, motioning to him to go up the hill. By this time
the bear had gained his feet and was coming back along the trail as hard
as he could. His head hung low, his ears were laid back and his long
tongue lolled from his mouth. The noise of the shot had put every one on
the alert, and it made Jack laugh a little to look back and see his two
companions and all the pack horses scramble up the hill as hard as they
could. The bear covered forty or fifty yards, running fast and strong,
and then, seeming to notice the people on the hill above it, turned and
rushed toward Jack, but before it had got anywhere near him, it began to
go more and more slowly and to stagger a little and presently fell,
rolled over backwards two or three times and then lay still. The three
men with their pack horses came together on the hill, well above the
bear, and Hugh said, “Well, son, what’s the matter with you? Do you want
to stampede this outfit? Looks to me like you’ve got quite a bear
there.”
“Why, yes, Hugh, he’s about the prettiest bear I ever saw. He looked so
handsome standing there on the hillside that I couldn’t help taking a
shot at him. I think he has a good hide, too, but maybe I oughtn’t to
have fired, for it will take us some time to skin him and while we’re
doing that the flies will be getting in their work.”
“That’s so,” said Hugh, “but now that he’s dead, we’ve got to take his
coat off. I’ll tell you what we’d better do. You and Joe go on to that
little point that you see sticking out there, just this side of where
that big creek comes down, and make camp there. Get as far out toward
the water as you can. I think maybe the breeze will keep the flies down,
and we can stop there with comfort. I’ll stay here and start in to skin
the bear, and after you’ve made camp you come back with a pack horse and
we’ll take the hide into camp.”
“Hold on, Hugh,” said Jack. “That’s a kind of a low-down trick for me to
kill this bear, and then leave you here to skin it and fight flies. Let
me stop here with you now and take the skin off and let Joe go on and
make camp. If the flies are not bad he can do it alone just about as
well as we could together, and if they are, he’ll have to make a smoke
for the stock and unpack, and when you and I get back with this hide, it
won’t take long to put up the tent.”
“Well,” said Hugh, “maybe that is better. It’ll shorten up the work to
skin now.”
Hugh explained again to Joe where it was that he wanted to camp, and Joe
went on with the pack horses. Hugh and Jack sat down by the bear and
began to skin it.
“Now, I want you to take notice, son,” said Hugh. “Here it is July and
this bear hasn’t begun to shed out a bit yet nor even to get sunburned,
and yet maybe he’s been out of his den now for two months or more. He
isn’t fat; he’s lost considerable flesh since he’s come out, but his
coat is just as good as it was the day he left his den.”
“I’ve always heard, Hugh,” said Jack, “that bears, when they come out of
their dens, are just as fat as when they go into them.”
“That’s what everybody says,” said Hugh, “and I reckon it’s true. I
never happened to kill a bear right fresh from its den, but I’ve killed
them in May and found them very fat. I’ve a kind of an idea that they
lose their fat slowly. Most people say that when they come out and start
wandering about looking for food they keep going all the time and get
poor right away. I don’t quite believe that is so. I’m pretty sure they
don’t get much to eat at first, and I’ve a notion that if they lost
their fat right away some of them would starve to death before food got
plenty. When we get this fellow’s skin off, I’m going to look into his
stomach and see what he’s had to eat in the last twenty-four hours.”
“That’ll be good,” said Jack. “I’d like to see, too.”
For some time the skinning went on in silence and the hide began to drop
from both sides of the great carcass.
“I tell you, Hugh,” said Jack, “this skin beats any one of those that we
got last summer down in North Park. I think it’s fully as big as the
biggest one that we got then, and it seems to me that the hair is twice
as long and twice as silky.”
“Yes,” said Hugh, “it’s an awful good hide. I don’t know when I’ve seen
one that was much better. You must remember that those we killed last
summer were not in good order; the winter coat had only just begun to
grow. This hide will make a fine robe if we can get anybody to tan it.”
“How do you mean, Hugh?” said Jack. “Won’t any woman tan this hide if we
pay her for it?”
“Why, no, son, you know a great deal better than that. Haven’t I told
you a good many times that lots of Blackfeet women won’t touch a bear
hide on any terms? You know the Blackfeet, anyhow, are afraid of bears
and think they’re powerful medicine. A good many of them won’t call a
bear by his name. They call him Sticky Mouth. Most of them won’t sit on
a bear robe. There are some medicine men or priests that can wear a kind
of cap made of a strip of bearskin on the head, but it’s hard to find a
woman that has the power to tan a bear hide. They are afraid of the
spirit of the bear; afraid that it will bring them bad luck.”
“Now, Hugh,” said Jack, “I don’t remember that you ever told me about
that before. I know that the Indians think that a bear is mighty smart
and has great power, and I know that the Eastern Indians when they
killed a bear used to smoke to the head and make the head presents of
tobacco, but I didn’t know that they wouldn’t touch a bear hide.”
“Well,” said Hugh, “you know it now. There’s only now and then one of
these Piegan women that would dare to dress a bear hide. We may find
such a woman in camp when we go back, but the chances are against it.
However, I reckon we’ll manage somehow to get the hide tanned.”
While they were talking thus, both workers were plying the knife
vigorously and in a little while the hide was free all around and the
carcass was slipped off it. Then Hugh, cutting into the bear’s stomach,
turned out its contents on the ground. It was almost empty, containing
nothing but two or three wads of grass and a single ground squirrel,
which had been swallowed whole.
“You see,” said Hugh, “this fellow hasn’t had much to eat, and you see,
too, that he’s got quite a little fat left on his carcass. I reckon
maybe he’s been down along the shore of the lake to see if he couldn’t
pick up a fish or two that had drifted ashore, and not having found
anything there, he was going back up onto the mountain to try to dig
out a gopher, or a woodchuck, or one of those little rock rabbits.”
They now folded the bear hide, and while Jack held his horse, Hugh tried
to tie on the hide behind the saddle, but the horse would have none of
it. He struggled and pulled back, and it was only by blinding him with a
coat--an operation which took some time and involved some trouble
because both men were covered with bear’s grease, the scent of which
frightened the horse--that they could get him blindfolded and the hide
firmly lashed in position.
“Now, Hugh,” said Jack, “I’m not proposing to get onto that horse on
this side hill. The chances are that he’d buck and very likely drop me
off on a rock. I’ll walk and lead him until he’s a little more used to
his load.”
“Well,” said Hugh, “that’s pretty sensible. You go ahead and lead him
and I’ll follow, and if he pulls away from you, why I’ll drive him along
the trail.”
Jack took the blind from the horse’s head and taking up his gun went
down toward the trail. The horse, however, was afraid of his load and
bucked pretty savagely. They had, however, taken the precaution to cinch
the saddle tightly, and the lashing held, so that, at length, the badly
frightened horse followed more or less uneasily along the trail, Hugh
riding behind him and having some trouble in controlling his own animal,
into whose nostrils the scent of the bear hide was constantly blown.
Their progress toward camp was slow, but an hour after they started they
reached it and found the horses feeding near it not greatly troubled by
the flies, for a strong wind was now blowing down the lake.
During the afternoon, while Hugh was getting the camp in shape and
cooking supper, the two boys stretched the bear hide and went over it
with a knife, scraping from it all possible grease. After supper and
just before sundown, Jack, casting at the mouth of the turbulent
mountain stream which here poured itself into the lake, caught a dozen
splendid trout, some of which gave him fine sport.
After nightfall, the breeze which swept down from the mountains was so
cool that the mosquitoes ceased to be troublesome, and they sat about
the camp fire enjoying its grateful warmth. Presently Joe broke out and
said, “Where are we going, White Bull? I never came into the mountains
so far as this, and I don’t know this country.”
“Well,” said Hugh, “I ain’t much surprised at that, for the Piegans
don’t go much into the mountains. They are afraid of the bears and of
the bad ghosts that live there.”
“Yes,” said Joe, “that is true. The Piegans like the open prairie, where
there is always plenty of light and where you can see a long way. The
only people here that go much into the mountains are the Kootenays and
the Stonies. Sometimes the Bloods go in a little way to hunt or trap
beaver, but not far. Plenty of men in my tribe would stop right here;
they would not go any further. Up above here, on this lake, I see that
the mountains come close together, and there is only just room enough
for the water to get through. We don’t know what there is beyond there
and we do not want to go to meet the dangers that may be there.”
“Why,” said Jack, “you don’t feel that way, do you, Joe? You’ve been
pretty nearly raised among white people. You are not afraid of the
mountains, are you?”
“No,” replied Joe, “I’m not much afraid of them. I’m a little afraid,
but I don’t know what there is up behind these rocks that we see ahead
of us. Only to-day we saw this awful big bear that you killed. Maybe up
in the mountains there are more bears and bigger ones and worse. I would
like to see what there is up there, but then I know that it may be very
dangerous to go there.”
“Well,” said Hugh, with a smile, “we haven’t talked much about it, but I
thought we’d just go up here along the lake and get to the head of it
and then follow up the river that comes into it and keep on climbing
until we got to the head of that river. Somewhere, not very far away, it
must begin, and must come falling down from these high peaks, because
not very far beyond here there are other rivers running the other way,
so that we are here somewhere near the backbone of this country.
“Well,” said Joe, “I’d like to see it. In old times you know the Piegans
were not afraid of the mountains as they are now. In old times they used
to cross over these mountains and go beyond, into the country of the
Snakes and the Kootenays and the River people,[A] and used to take
horses from them and drive them back through the mountains; also, they
used to go through the mountains and make long journeys to war to the
southwest, and if they found little parties of white men who were
trapping or trading, they would try and take their horses and a scalp
or two, if they could. I have heard old people tell about how their
fathers used to go on these war journeys and used to fight everyone that
they met, white people or Indians.”
[A] The Kalespelms, more commonly called Flathead Indians, who dwell
on and near Lake Pend d’Oreille.
“Yes,” said Hugh, “that’s so. In the early days before my time the
Blackfeet were thought to be a terrible people.”
“Yes, indeed,” said Jack, “I’ve read some of the old books about the
early trappers and they are always talking about the danger from the
Blackfeet, and how they would lie in wait for the trappers, as they went
along the streams gathering their fur in the morning, and kill them, or
how they would try to run off their horses. Sometimes they would have
big battles with them. The trappers, I think, were mostly at peace with
the Snakes and perhaps with other tribes, and often camped with them,
and when the Blackfeet were troublesome, if the trappers had Indian
allies, they often used to follow up the Blackfeet, and punish them
pretty severely for the raids they had made on them.”
“Well,” said Hugh, “as I was saying, we haven’t talked much about this
and none of us here know much about the country ahead of us. I came up
once, trapping, as far as the head of the lake. I got a few beaver, and
once I killed an elk just above the head of the lake, but beyond there I
have not been. Still, I guess we’ll be able to find our way. The valley
is narrow and the mountains high on either side, and we cannot very well
get out of that trough, but, on the other hand, it may be pretty bad
going there. The whole valley may be a swamp or a succession of little
lakes and it’s possible that we can’t find a way to the head of it at
all. The only way to learn about it is to try. Anyhow, it’s new country.
I never heard of anybody going up on the river above the lake, except
one man, old man Ellis. He told me once about going up there and said
that he got across to the other side of the range, but he said it was
pretty hard traveling for the animals, and that in one place they had to
lower their horses by ropes over some bad places.”
“Do you mean to say, Hugh, that no white men have been up here, except
that one?”
“He’s the only one I ever heard about,” replied Hugh. “And I never felt
quite sure that he got as far as he thought he did. At all events it
won’t be a bad trip to make, unless the flies are too awful bothersome,
and by the way, son, to-morrow morning before we start, we’d better get
out that strip of mosquito bar that you put in. If the mosquitoes are
bad we’ll need it before very long.”
“I’ll do that, Hugh,” said Jack. “But what do you suppose we’ll find up
there at the head of the river?”
“It’s pretty hard to say,” Hugh answered. “I expect we’ll find lots of
rocks and stone and ice, probably lots of game, and we’ll surely see
some mighty pretty scenery; high peaks and big snow fields. There sure
ought to be lots of sheep and goats up there, some elk, maybe a moose or
two, and of course some bears, but that doesn’t mean that we’re going to
get all this game. It only means maybe that we’ll see some of it;
perhaps only some signs of it. Just how far we can take the horses, of
course, I don’t know. We’ll have to try and do the best we can. Likely
enough, we’ll know a lot more about it three or four days from now.”
“Well,” said Jack, “I’ll be mighty glad to get up there and see what
there is.”
“Yes,” agreed Joe, “that will be good. I shall have plenty of things to
tell the people when I get back to the camp after this trip.”