the hammers, catching against a rock, should explode the charge.

At length, thinking it should be near enough, I ceased pulling, when Joe
straightened up, reached out, and, to my great delight, when he withdrew
his hand the gun was in it.

Ah! What a difference it made in our situation!

Joe, first opening the breach to make sure the gun was loaded, advanced
as near the bear as he dared, and kneeling down took careful aim at his
chest. But presently he lowered the gun again, and turning to me, said:

"Phil, can you do anything to make him turn his head so that I can get a
chance at him behind the ear? I'm afraid a shot in front may only wound
him."

"All right," said I. "I'll try."

With my knife I pried out of the face of the cliff a piece of stone
about the size and shape of the palm of my hand, and aiming carefully I
threw it at the bear. It struck him on the very point of his nose--a
tender spot--and seemingly hurt him a good deal, for, with an angry
snarl, he rose upright on his hind feet.

At that instant a terrific report resounded up and down the canyon, the
whole charge of Joe's ponderous weapon struck the bear full in the
chest--I could see the hole it made--and without a sound the great beast
dropped from the ledge, fell a hundred feet upon the rocks below,
bounded two or three times and then lay still, all doubled up in a heap
at the bottom.

Big Reuben had killed his last pig!

CHAPTER II

CRAWFORD'S BASIN

You might think, perhaps, as many people in our neighborhood thought,
that Joe was my brother. As a matter of fact he was no relation at all;
he had dropped in upon us, a stranger, two years before, and had stayed
with us ever since.

It was in the haying season that he came, at a moment when my father and
I were overwhelmed with work; for it was the summer of 1879, the year of
"the Leadville excitement," when all the able-bodied men in the district
were either rushing off to Leadville itself or going off prospecting all
over the mountains in the hope of unearthing other Leadvilles. Ranch
work was much too slow for them, and as a consequence it was impossible
for us to secure any help that was worth having.

What made it all the more provoking was that we had that year an
extra-fine stand of grass--the weather, too, was magnificent--yet,
unless we could get help, it was hardly likely that we could take full
advantage of our splendid hay-crop.

Nevertheless, as what could not b