The Dog Crusoe and His Master: A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies, - [books for new readers .TXT] 📗

he looked up and uttered
a long melancholy howl.

"Ah! I knowed it," said Dick, pushing forward.
"Come on, pup; you'll have to follow now. Any way
we must go on."

The snow that had fallen was not deep enough to
offer the slightest obstruction to their advance. It was,
indeed, only one of those occasional showers common to
that part of the country in the late autumn, which
season had now crept upon Dick almost before he was
aware of it, and he fully expected that it would melt
away in a few days. In this hope he kept steadily
advancing, until he found himself in the midst of those
rocky fastnesses which divide the waters that flow into
the Atlantic from those that flow into the Pacific Ocean.
Still the slight crust of snow lay on the ground, and he
had no means of knowing whether he was going in the
right direction or not.

Game was abundant, and there was no lack of wood
now, so that his night bivouac was not so cold or dreary
as might have been expected.

Travelling, however, had become difficult, and even
dangerous, owing to the rugged nature of the ground
over which he proceeded. The scenery had completely
changed in its character. Dick no longer coursed over
the free, open plains, but he passed through beautiful
valleys filled with luxuriant trees, and hemmed in by
stupendous mountains, whose rugged sides rose upward
until the snow-clad peaks pierced the clouds.

There was something awful in these dark solitudes,
quite overwhelming to a youth of Dick's temperament.
His heart began to sink lower and lower every day, and
the utter impossibility of making up his mind what to
do became at length agonizing. To have turned and
gone back the hundreds of miles over which he had
travelled would have caused him some anxiety under
any circumstances, but to do so while Joe and Henri
were either wandering about there or in the power of
the savages was, he felt, out of the question. Yet in
which way should he go? Whatever course he took
might lead him farther and farther away from them.

In this dilemma he came to the determination of
remaining where he was, at least until the snow should
leave the ground.

He felt great relief even when this hopeless course
was decided upon, and set about making himself an encampment
with some degree of cheerfulness. When he
had completed this task, he took his rifle, and leaving
Charlie picketed in the centre of a dell, where the long,
rich grass rose high above the snow, went off to hunt.

On turning a rocky point his heart suddenly bounded
into his throat, for there, not thirty yards distant, stood
a huge grizzly bear!

Yes, there he was at last, the monster to meet which
the young hunter had so often longed--the terrible size
and fierceness of which he had heard so often spoken
about by the old hunters. There it stood at last; but
little did Dick Varley think that the first time he should
meet with his foe should be when alone in the dark recesses
of the Rocky Mountains, and with none to succour
him in the event of the battle going against him. Yes,
there was one. The faithful Crusoe stood by his side,
with his hair bristling, all his formidable teeth exposed,
and his eyes glaring in their sockets. Alas for poor
Crusoe had he gone into that combat alone! One stroke
of that monster's paw would have hurled him dead upon
the ground.



CHAPTER XVII.


Dick's first fight with a grizzly--Adventure with a
deer--A surprise.


There is no animal in all the land so terrible and
dangerous as the grizzly bear. Not only is he the
largest of the species in America, but he is the fiercest,
the strongest, and the most tenacious of life--facts which
are so well understood that few of the western hunters
like to meet him single-handed, unless they happen
to be first-rate shots; and the Indians deem the encounter
so dangerous that to wear a collar composed
of the claws of a grizzly bear of his own killing is
counted one of the highest honours to which a young
warrior can attain.

The grizzly bear resembles the brown bear of Europe,
but it is larger, and the hair is long, the points being
of a paler shade. About the head there is a considerable
mixture of gray hair, giving it the "grizzly" appearance
from which it derives its name. The claws are
dirty white, arched, and very long, and so strong that
when the animal strikes with its paw they cut like a
chisel. These claws are not embedded in the paw, as
is the case with the cat, but always project far beyond
the hair, thus giving to the foot a very ungainly appearance.
They are not sufficiently curved to enable the
grizzly bear to climb trees, like the black and brown
bears; and this inability on their part is often the only
hope of the pursued hunter, who, if he succeeds in
ascending a tree, is safe, for the time at least, from the
bear's assaults. But "Caleb" is a patient creature, and
will often wait at the foot of the tree for many hours
for his victim.

The average length of his body is about nine feet,
but he sometimes attains to a still larger growth.
Caleb is more carnivorous in his habits than other
bears; but, like them, he does not object to indulge
occasionally in vegetable diet, being partial to the bird-cherry,
the choke-berry, and various shrubs. He has
a sweet tooth, too, and revels in honey--when he can
get it.

The instant the grizzly bear beheld Dick Varley
standing in his path, he rose on his hind legs and made
a loud hissing noise, like a man breathing quick, but
much harsher. To this Crusoe replied by a deep growl,
and showing the utmost extent of his teeth, gums and
all; and Dick cocked both barrels of his rifle.

To say that Dick Varley felt no fear would be simply
to make him out that sort of hero which does not exist
in nature--namely, a perfect hero. He did feel a
sensation
as if his bowels had suddenly melted into water!
Let not our reader think the worse of Dick for this.
There is not a man living who, having met with a huge
grizzly bear for the first time in his life in a wild, solitary
place, all alone, has not experienced some such
sensation. There was no cowardice in this feeling.

Fear is not cowardice. Acting in a wrong and contemptible
manner because of our fear is cowardice.

It is said that Wellington or Napoleon, we forget
which, once stood watching the muster of the men who
were to form the forlorn-hope in storming a citadel.
There were many brave, strong, stalwart men there, in
the prime of life, and flushed with the blood of high
health and courage. There were also there a few stern-browed
men of riper years, who stood perfectly silent,
with lips compressed, and as pale as death. "Yonder
veterans," said the general, pointing to these soldiers,
"are men whose courage I can depend on; they know
what they are going to, the others don't!" Yes, these
young soldiers very probably were brave; the others
certainly were.

Dick Varley stood for a few seconds as if thunderstruck,
while the bear stood hissing at him. Then the
liquefaction of his interior ceased, and he felt a glow
of fire gush through his veins. Now Dick knew well
enough that to fly from a grizzly bear was the sure and
certain way of being torn to pieces, as when taken thus
by surprise they almost invariably follow a retreating
enemy. He also knew that if he stood where he was,
perfectly still, the bear would get uncomfortable under
his stare, and would retreat from him. But he neither
intended to run away himself nor to allow the bear to
do so; he intended to kill it, so he raised his rifle quickly,
"drew a bead," as the hunters express it, on the bear's
heart, and fired.

It immediately dropped on its fore legs and rushed
at him.
"Back, Crusoe! out of the way, pup!" shouted Dick, as
his favourite was about to spring forward.

The dog retired, and Dick leaped behind a tree. As
the bear passed he gave it the contents of the second
barrel behind the shoulder, which brought it down; but
in another moment it rose and again rushed at him.
Dick had no time to load, neither had he time to spring
up the thick tree beside which he stood, and the rocky
nature of the ground out of which it grew rendered it
impossible to dodge round it. His only resource was
flight; but where was he to fly to? If he ran along
the open track, the bear would overtake him in a few
seconds. On the right was a sheer precipice one hundred
feet high; on the left was an impenetrable thicket. In
despair he thought for an instant of clubbing his rifle
and meeting the monster in close conflict; but the utter
hopelessness of such an effort was too apparent to be
entertained for a moment. He glanced up at the overhanging
cliffs. There were one or two rents and projections
close above him. In the twinkling of an eye
he sprang up and grasped a ledge of about an inch
broad, ten or twelve feet up, to which he clung while
he glanced upward. Another projection was within
reach; he gained it, and in a few seconds he stood upon
a ledge about twenty feet up the cliff, where he had just
room to plant his feet firmly.

Without waiting to look behind, he seized his powder-horn
and loaded one barrel of his rifle; and well was it
for him that his early training had fitted him to do this
with rapidity, for the bear dashed up the precipice after
him at once. The first time it missed its hold, and fell
back with a savage growl; but on the second attempt
it sunk its long claws into the fissures between the rocks,
and ascended steadily till within a foot of the place
where Dick stood.

At this moment Crusoe's obedience gave way before
a sense of Dick's danger. Uttering one of his lion-like
roars, he rushed up the precipice with such violence
that, although naturally unable to climb, he reached and
seized the bear's flank, despite his master's stern order
to "keep back," and in a moment the two rolled down
the face of the rock together, just as Dick completed
loading.

Knowing that one stroke of the bear's paw would be
certain death to his poor dog, Dick leaped from his
perch, and with one bound reached the ground at the
same moment with the struggling animals, and close
beside them, and, before they had ceased rolling, he
placed the muzzle of his rifle into the bear's ear, and
blew out its brains.

Crusoe, strange to say, escaped with only one scratch
on the side. It was a deep one, but not dangerous, and
gave him but little pain at the time, although it caused
him many a smart for some weeks after.

Thus happily ended Dick's first encounter with a
grizzly bear; and although, in the course of his wild
life, he shot many specimens of "Caleb," he used to say
that "he an' pup were never so near goin' under as on
the day he dropped that bar!"

Having refreshed himself with a long draught from
a neighbouring rivulet, and washed Crusoe's wound,
Dick skinned the bear on the spot.
"We chawed him up that time, didn't we, pup?"
said Dick, with a smile of satisfaction, as he surveyed
his prize.

Crusoe looked up and assented to this.

"Gave us a hard tussle, though; very nigh sent us
both under, didn't he, pup?"

Crusoe agreed entirely, and, as if the remark reminded
him of honourable scars, he licked his wound.

"Ah, pup!" cried Dick, sympathetically, "does't hurt
ye, eh, poor dog?"

Hurt him? such a question! No, he should think
not; better ask if that leap from the precipice hurt
yourself.

So Crusoe might have said, but he didn't; he took
no notice of the remark whatever.

"We'll cut him up now, pup," continued Dick.
"The skin'll make a splendid bed for you an' me o'
nights, and a saddle for Charlie."

Dick cut out all the claws of the bear by the roots,
and spent the remainder of that night in cleaning them
and stringing them on a strip of leather to form a
necklace. Independently of the value of these enormous
claws (the largest as long as a man's middle finger) as
an evidence of prowess, they formed a remarkably graceful
collar, which Dick wore round his neck ever after
with as much pride as if he had been a Pawnee warrior.

When it was finished he held it out at arm's-length,
and said, "Crusoe, my pup, ain't ye proud of it? I'll
tell ye what it is, pup, the next time you an' I floor
Caleb, I'll put the claws round your neck, an' make ye
wear em ever arter, so I will."

The dog did not seem quite