MOUNTAIN CHARLEY.
Charles McKiernan was a well-known lumber merchant of San Jose, Cal.
To old timers he was "Mountain Charlie," having spent most of his life
in the Santa Cruz mountains, where he owned timber land and saw mills.
McKiernan's face was strangely disfigured. His left eye was missing
and his forehead was so badly scarred that he wore his hair in a bang
falling to his eyebrows to conceal the marks. From his own lips I
heard the story of those scars.
This was also in the days of the muzzle-loading rifle. McKiernan and a
partner were holding down timber claims in the mountains and living in
a cabin overlooking a wide canyon. One morning they saw a Grizzly
turning over rocks at the foot of a spur jutting from the main ridge
into the canyon, and taking their rifles they followed the ridge around
to the spur to get a shot at him from that point. It so happened that
the bear also fancied that he had business on the top of the spur, and
began climbing soon after the men lost sight of him.
The bear and the men met unexpectedly at the top, and the bear halted
hesitatingly with his head and breast just showing above the rocks at
the brink of the steep slope. McKiernan did not want to begin the
fight at such close quarters, and he was confident that the bear would
back down and attempt to return to the brush at the foot of the spur if
given time. Then he would have the advantage of the up-hill position
and plenty of time to reload if the bear should attempt to return after
the first shot.
But McKiernan's partner lost his nerve, turned tail and ran away, and
that encouraged the bear to take the offensive, just as it would invite
attack from a hesitating dog. The Grizzly sprang up over the edge of
the steep and charged McKiernan, who threw up his rifle and fired at
the bear's chest. It was a Yeager rifle carrying an ounce ball, and it
checked the charge for a moment by bringing the bear to his knees. As
the bear gathered himself for another rush, McKiernan swung the heavy
rifle and struck the bear over the head with the barrel. He was a
powerful man, accustomed to swinging an axe, and the blow knocked the
bear down and stunned him. The stock of the rifle broke in McKiernan's
hands and the barrel fell close by the bear, which had fallen upon the
very edge of a steep slope at the side of the spur or knob.
McKiernan stooped to recover the rifle barrel with which to beat the
bear to death, and in doing so his head came close to the bear's. The
Grizzly had partly recovered, and throwing his head upward he closed
his jaws upon McKiernan's forehead, with a snap like a steel trap. One
lower tusk entered the left eye socket, and an upper canine tooth sunk
into the skull. McKiernan fell face downward, his arms under his face,
and the bear slid over the edge and rolled down the almost vertical
wall into the canyon, having dislodged himself by the effort to seize
the man.
McKiernan did not lose consciousness, but he was unable to move. He
knew his left eye was gone, and he feared that he was bleeding to
death. He heard the bear rolling down the slope, heard the crash of
bushes as he struck the bottom, and knew because of his bawling that
the Grizzly was mortally hurt. Then he wondered why his partner did
not come to him, and sense of pain and fear of death were submerged
under a wave of indignation at the man's cowardice and flight.
Presently he heard faintly a voice calling him across the canyon, but
could not distinguish the words, and after a time he realized that his
partner had fled back to the cabin, and was shouting to him. He could
not answer, nor could he raise his head, but he managed to free one arm
and wave it feebly. The partner finally saw the movement and plucked
up enough courage to come back, and with his help McKiernan somehow got
to the cabin.
A young doctor from San Jose attempted to patch up the broken skull
after removing a large piece and leaving the envelope of the brain
exposed. He had read something about trephining and inserting silver
plates, and he hammered out a silver dollar and set it like a piece of
mosaic into McKiernan's forehead, where it resisted the efforts of
nature to repair damages and caused McKiernan a thousand times more
agony than he had suffered from the Grizzly's tusks. Only the
marvelous vitality of the man saved him from the consequences of such
surgery. For days and weeks he sat in his cabin dripping his life away
out of a wound that closed, swelled with fierce pain and broke out
afresh, and the drain upon his system gave him an incredible appetite
for meat, which he devoured in Gargantuan quantities.
Then old Doctor Spencer went up to "Mountain Charlie's" cabin, took out
the silver dollar, removed a wad of eyebrow that had been pushed into
the hole made by the bear's lower tooth in the eye socket, and
McKiernan recovered.
And the first thing he did when he was able to travel was to load up a
shotgun and hunt San Jose from one end to the other for the man who had
set a silver dollar in his skull.