The next morning our American companions bade us farewell, and resumed
their journey; but Captain Finn insisted that Gabriel, Roche, and I
should not leave him so soon. He pointed out that my steed would not be
able to travel much farther, if I did not give him at least two or three
days' repose; as for the horses of my two companions, they had become
quite useless, and our host charged himself with procuring them others,
which would carry them back to the Comanches.
Captain Finn's hospitality was not, however, so heavily taxed, for
during the day a flotilla of fifteen canoes stopped before the
plantation, and a dozen of French traders came up to the house. They
were intimate friends of the captain, who had known them for a long
time, and it fortunately happened that they were proceeding with goods
to purchase the furs of the Pawnee Picts. They offered a passage to
Gabriel and Roche, who, of course, accepted the welcome proposition.
They embarked their saddles with sundry provisions, which the good Mrs
Finn forced upon them, while her hospitable husband, unknown to them,
put into the canoes a bale of such articles as he thought would be
useful to them during their long journey. The gift, as I afterwards
learned, was composed of pistols and holsters, a small keg of powder,
bars of lead, new bits and stirrups, and of four Mackinaw blankets.
At last the moment arrived when I was to part with my friends. I felt a
bitter pang, and I wept when I found myself alone. However, I consoled
myself with the reflection that our separation was not to be a long one,
and, cheered up by the captain, I soon overcame the bitterness of the
separation. Yet, for months afterwards, I felt lonely and tired of
myself; I had never had an idea how painful it is to part from the only
few individuals who are attached to you. My worthy host showed much
interest in my welfare. As he had some business to transact at the Land
Office in the Arkansas, he resolved that he would accompany me two or
three days on my journey. Five days after the departure of Gabriel and
Roche, we crossed the Red River, and soon arrived at Washington, the
only place of any importance in the west of Arkansas.
From Washington to Little Rock, the capital of the state, there is a
mail-road, with farms at every fifteen or twenty miles; but the captain
informed me they were inhabited by the refuse from other states, and
that west of the Mississippi (except in Louisiana and Missouri,) it was
always safer to travel through the wilderness, and camp out. We
accordingly took the back-wood trail, across a hilly and romantic
country, entirely mineral, and full of extinct, volcanoes. The quantity
of game found in these parts is incredible; every ten minutes we would
start a band of some twenty turkeys. At all times, deer were seen
grazing within rifle-shot, and I don't think that, on our first day's
journey over the hills, we met less than twenty bears.
Independent of his love for the wilderness, and his hatred of
bowie-knife men, Captain Finn had another reason for not following the
mail-road. He had business to transact at the celebrated hot springs,
and he had to call on his way upon one of his brothers-in-law, a son of
Boone, and a mighty hunter, who had settled in the very heart of the
mountains, and who made it a rule to take a trip every spring to the
Rocky Mountains. The second day, at noon, after a toilsome ascent of a
few thousand feet; we arrived at a small clearing on the top of the
mountains, where the barking of the dogs and the crowing of the fowls
announced the vicinity of a habitation, and, ere many minutes had
elapsed, we heard the sharp report of a rifle.
"Young Boone's own, I declare," exclaimed Finn; "'twas I that gave him
the tool. I should know its crack amidst a thousand. Now mark me,
chief, Boone never misses; he has killed a deer or a bear; if the first,
search for a hole between the fifth and sixth rib; if a bear, look in
the eye. At all events, the young chap is a capital cook, and we arrive
in good time. Did I not say so? By all the alligators in the swamps!
Eh, Boone, my boy, how fares it with ye?"
We had by this time arrived at the spot where the buck lay dead, and
near the body was standing the gaunt form of a man, about forty years
old, dressed in tanned leather, and standing six feet nine in his
mocassins. Though we were within a yard of him, he reloaded his rifle
with imperturbable gravity, and it was only when he had finished that
job that I could perceive his grim features beaming with a smile.
"Welcome, old boy; welcome, stranger; twice welcome to the hunter's
home. I knew somebody was coming, because I saw the pigeons were flying
up from the valley below; and as dried venison won't do after a morning
trip, why, I took the rifle to kill a beast out of my _flock_." The
hunter grinned at his conceit. "You see," he continued, "this place of
mine is a genuine spot for a hunter. Every morning, from my threshold,
can shoot a deer, a bear, or a turkey. I can't abide living in a
country where an honest man must toil a whole day for a mouthful of
meat; it would never do for me. Down Blackey, down Judith, down dogs.
Old boy, take the scalping-knife and skin the beast under the red oak."
This second part of the sentence was addressed to a young lad of
sixteen, an inmate of the hunter's cabin; and the dogs, having come to
the conclusion that we were not robbers, allowed us to dismount our
horses. The cabin was certainly the _ne plus ultra_ of simplicity, and
yet it was comfortable. Four square logs supported a board--it was the
table; many more were used as _fauteuils_; and buffalo and bear hides,
rolled in a corner of the room, were the bedding. A stone jug, two tin
cups, and a large boiler completed the furniture of the cabin. There
was no chimney; all the cooking was done outside. In due time we
feasted upon the hunter's spoil, and, by way of passing the time, Boone
related to us his first grizzly bear expedition.
While a very young man, he had gone to the great mountain; of the West
with a party of trappers. His great strength and dexterity in handling
the axe, and the deadly precision of his aim with the rifle, had given
him a reputation among his companions, and yet they were always talking
to him as if he were a boy, because he had not yet followed the
Red-skins on the war-path, nor fought a grizzly bear, which deed is
considered quite as honourable and more perilous.
Young Boone waited patiently for an opportunity, when one day he
witnessed a terrible conflict, in which one of these huge monsters,
although wounded by twenty balls, was so closely pursuing the trappers,
his companions, that they were compelled to seek their safety by
plunging into the very middle of abroad river. There, fortunately, the
strength of the animal failed, and the stream rolled him away. It had
been a terrible fight, and for many days the young man would shudder at
the recollection; but he could no longer bear the taunts which were
bestowed upon him, and, without announcing his intention to his
companions, he resolved to leave them and bring back with him the claws
of a grizzly bear, or die in the attempt. For two days he watched in
the passes of the mountains, till he discovered, behind some bushes, the
mouth of a dark cave, under a mass of rocks. The stench which proceeded
from it and the marks at the entrance were sufficient to point out to
the hunter that it contained the object of his search; but, as the sun
had set, he reflected that the beast was to a certainty awake, and most
probably out in search of prey. Boone climbed up a tree, from which he
could watch the entrance of the cave; having secured himself and his
rifle against a fall, by thongs of leather, with which a hunter is
always provided, fatigue overpowered him, and he slept.
At morn he was awakened by a growl and a rustling noise below; it was
the bear dragging to his abode the carcase of a buck. When he thought
that the animal was glutted with flesh, and sleeping, Boone descended
the tree, and, leaning his rifle against the rock, he crawled into the
cave to reconnoitre. It must have been a terrible moment; but he had
made up his mind, and he possessed all the courage of his father: the
cave was spacious and dark. The heavy grunt of the animal showed that
he was asleep.
By degrees, the vision of Boone became more clear, and he perceived the
shaggy mass at about ten feet from him and about twenty yards from the
entrance of the cave. The ground under him yielded to his weight, for
it was deeply covered with the bones of animals, and more than once he
thought himself lost, when rats, snakes, and other reptiles, disturbed
by him from their meal, would start away, in every direction, with loud
hissing, and other noises. The brute, however, never awoke, and Boone,
having finished his survey, crawled out from this horrid den to prepare
for the attack.
He first cut a piece of pitch-pine, six or seven feet long, then taking
from his pouch a small cake of bees'-wax, he wrapped it round one end of
the stick, it at the extremity the shape of a small cup, to hold some
whisky. This done, he re-entered the cavern, turned to his left, fixed
his new kind of flambeau upright against the wall, poured the liquor in
the wax cup, and then went out again to procure fire. With the
remainder of his wax and a piece of cotton twine, he made a small taper
which he lighted, and crawled in again over the bones, shading his light
with one hand, till he had applied the flame to the whisky. The liquor
was above proof, and as Boone returned and took up his position nearer
the entrance, with his rifle, it threw up a vivid flame, which soon
ignited the wax and the pitch-pine itself.
The bear required something more than light to awake him from his almost
lethargic sleep, and Boone threw bone after bone at him, till the brute
woke up, growled with astonishment at the unusual sight before him, and
advanced lazily to examine it. The young man had caught up his rifle by
the barrel; he took a long and steady aim, as he knew that he must die
if the bear was only wounded; and as the angry animal raised his paw to
strike down the obnoxious torch, he fired. There was a heavy fall, a
groan, and a struggle,--the light was extinguished, and all was dark as
before. The next morning Boone rejoined his companions as they were
taking their morning meal, and, throwing at their feet his bleeding
trophies, he said to them, "Now, who will dare to say that I am not a
man?"
The history of this bold deed spread in a short time to even the
remotest tribes of the North, and when, years afterwards, Boone fell a
prisoner to the Black-feet Indians, they restored him to liberty and
loaded him with presents, saying, that they could not hurt the great
brave who had vanquished in his own den the evil spirit of the
mountains.
At another time, Boone, when hardly pressed by a party of the Flat-head
Indians, fell into a crevice and broke the butt of his rifle. He was
safe, however, from immediate danger; at least, he thought so, and
resolved he would remain where he was till his pursuers should abandon
their search. On examining the place which had afforded him so
opportune a refuge, he perceived it was a spacious natural cave, having
no other entrance than the hole or aperture through which he had fallen.
He thanked Providence for this fortunate discovery, as, for the future,
he would have a safe place to conceal his skins and provisions while
trapping; but as he was prosecuting his search, he perceived with dismay
that the cave was already inhabited.
In a corner he perceived two jaguars, which followed his movements with
glaring eyes. A single glance satisfied him they were cubs; but a
maddening thought shot across his brain: the mother was out, probably
not far; she might return in a moment, and he had no arms, except his
knife and the barrel of his broken rifle. While musing upon his
perilous situation, he heard a roar, which summoned all his energy; he
rolled a loose mass of rock to the entrance; made it as firm as he
could, by backing it with other stones; tied his knife to the end of his
rifle barrel, and calmly waited for the issue. A minute passed, when a
tremendous jaguar dashed against the rock, and Boone needed all his
giant's strength to prevent it from giving way.
Perceiving that main force could not dear the passage, the animal began
scratching and digging at the entrance, and its hideous roars were soon
responded to by the cubs, which threw themselves upon Boone. He kicked
them away, but not without receiving several ugly scratches, and,
thrusting the blade of his knife through the opening between the large
stone and the solid rock, he broke it in the shoulder of the female
jaguar, which, with a yell, started away. This respite was fortunate,
as by this time Boone's strength was exhausted; he profited by the
suspension of hostility, so as to increase the impediments, in case of a
new attack; and reflecting that the mewings of the cubs attracted and
enraged the mother, he knocked their brains out with the barrel of his
rifle. During two hours, he was left to repose himself after his
exertions, and he was beginning to think the animal had been scared
away, when another terrible bound against the massive stone forced it a
few inches into the cave. For an hour he struggled, till the jaguar,
itself tired, and not hearing the mewings of her cubs, retired with a
piteous howl.
Night came, and Boone began to despond. Leaving the cave was out of
question, for the brute was undoubtedly watching for him; and yet
remaining was almost as dangerous, as long watching and continual
exertion weighed down his eyelids and rendered sleep imperative. He
decided to remain where he was and after another hour of labour in
fortifying the entrance, he lay down to sleep, with the barrel of his
rifle close to him, in case of attack.
He had slept about three or four hours, when he was awakened by a noise
close to his head. The moon was shining, and shot her beams through the
crevices at the mouth of the cave. A foreboding of danger would not
allow Boone to sleep any more; he was watching with intense anxiety,
when he observed several of the smaller stones he had placed round the
piece of rock rolling towards him, and that the rays of light streaming
into the cave were occasionally darkened by some interposed body. It
was the jaguar, which had been undermining the rock: one after the
other, the stones gave way; Boone rose, grasped his heavy rifle barrel,
and determined to await the attack of the animal.
In a second or two, the heavy stone rolled a few feet into the cave; the
jaguar advanced her head then her shoulders, and at last, a noiseless
bound brought her within four feet of Boone who at that critical moment
collecting all his strength for a decisive blow, dashed her skull to
atoms. Boone, quite exhausted, drank some of her blood to allay his
thirst, pillowed his head upon her body, and fell into a deep sleep.
The next morning Boone, after having made a good meal off one of the
cubs, started to rejoin his companions, and communicated to them his
adventure and discovery. A short time afterwards, the cave was stored
with all the articles necessary to a trapper's life, and soon became the
rendezvous of all the adventurous men from the banks of the river Platte
to the shores of the Great Salt Lake.
Since Boone had settled in his present abode, he had had a hand-to-hand
fight with a black bear, in the very room where we were sitting. When
he had built his log cabin, it was with the intention of taking to
himself a wife. At that time he courted the daughter of one of the old
Arkansas settlers, and he wished to have "a place and a crop on foot"
before he married. The girl was killed by the fall of a tree, and
Boone, in his sorrow, sent away, the men whom he had hired to help him
in "turning his field," for he wished to be alone.
Months elapsed, and his crop of corn promised an abundant harvest; but
he cared not. He would take his rifle and remain sometimes for a month
in the woods, brooding over his loss. The season was far advanced,
when, one day returning home, he perceived that the bears, the
squirrels, and the deer had made rather free with the golden ears of his
corn. The remainder he resolved to save for the use of his horse, and
as he wished to begin harvest next morning, he slept that night in the
cabin, on his solitary pallet. The heat was intense, and, as usual in
these countries during summer, he had left his door wide open.
It was about midnight, when he heard something tumbling in the room; he
rose in a moment, and, hearing a short and heavy breathing, he asked who
it was, for the darkness was such, that he could not see two yards
before him. No answer being given, except a kind of half-smothered
grunt, he advanced, and, putting out his hand, he seized the shaggy coat
of a bear. Surprise rendered him motionless, and the animal giving him
a blow in the chest with his terrible paw, threw him down outside the
door. Boone could have escaped, but, maddened with the pain of his
fall, he only thought of vengeance, and, seizing his knife and tomahawk,
which were fortunately within his reach, he darted furiously at the
beast, dealing blows at random. Great as was his strength, his tomahawk
could not penetrate through the thick coat of the animal, which, having
encircled the body of his assailant with his paws, was pressing him in
one of those deadly embraces which could only have been resisted by a
giant like Boone. Fortunately, the black bear, unlike the grizzly, very
seldom uses his claws and teeth in fighting, contenting himself with
smothering his victim. Boone disentangled his left arm, and with his
knife dealt a furious blow upon the snout of the animal, which, smarting
with pain, released his hold. The snout is the only vulnerable part in
an old black bear. Even at forty yards, the ball of a rifle will
flatten against his skull, and if in any other part of the body, it will
scarcely produce any serious effect.
Boone, aware of this, and not daring to risk another hug, darted away
from the cabin. The bear, now quite angry, followed and overtook him
near the fence. Fortunately the clouds were clearing away, and the moon
threw light sufficient to enable the hunter to strike with a more
certain aim: chance also favoured him; he found on the ground one of the
rails made of the blue ash, very heavy, and ten feet in length; he
dropped his knife and tomahawk, and seizing the rail, he renewed the
fight with caution, for it had now become a struggle for life or death.
Had it been a bull or a panther, they would have had their bones
shivered to pieces by the tremendous blows which Boone dealt upon his
adversary with all the strength of despair; but Bruin is by nature an
admirable fencer, and, in spite of his unwieldy shape, there is not in
the world an animal whose motions are more rapid in a close encounter.
Once or twice he was knocked down by the force of the blows, but
generally he would parry them with a wonderful agility. At last, he
succeeded in seizing the other end of the rail, and dragged it towards
him with irresistible force. Both man and beast fell, Boone rolling to
the place where he had dropped his arms, while the bear advanced upon
him; the moment was a critical one, but Boone was accustomed to look at
and brave death under every shape, and with a steady hand he buried his
tomahawk in the snout of his enemy, and, turning round, he rushed to his
cabin, believing he would have time to secure the door. He closed the
latch, and applied his shoulders to it; but it was of no avail, the
terrible brute dashed in head foremost, and tumbled in the room with
Boone and the fragments of the door. The two foes rose and stared at
each other; Boone had nothing left but his knife, but Bruin was
tottering and unsteady, and Boone felt that the match was more equal:
once more they closed.
A few hours after sunrise, Captain Finn, returning home from the
Legislature at Little Rock, called upon his friend, and, to his horror,
found him apparently lifeless on the floor, and alongside of him, the
body of the bear. Boone soon recovered, and found that the lucky blow
which had saved him from being crushed to death had buried the whole
blade of his knife, through the left eye, in the very brain of the
animal. [See note 1.]
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Note 1. The black bear does not grow to any great size in the eastern
and northern parts of America, but in Arkansas and the adjacent states
it becomes, from its size and strength, almost as formidable an
antagonist as a grizzly bear. It is very common to find them eight
hundred weight, but sometimes they weigh above a thousand pounds.