nally disappeared over the peak
where first seen.

The boys sat for a while in silence, gazing away in the distance, where
the noble bird had vanished, half-expecting it to reappear and probably
press its attack; but it had taken its flight for good and was seen no
more.

"I wonder whether we would have done any better if we had brought a dog
with us?" said Jack, beginning to feel a trifle discouraged over their
failure to secure a shot at any game.

"I proposed bringing my dog, you remember, when we left home, but you
thought we could do better out here. Hank and the rest of them don't
seem to place much value on the animals in hunting. Did you hear that?"

From some point not very far off came the report of a rifle, though
whether it was the weapon of Hank Hazletine or one of the Indians that
had been discharged, neither could guess.

"Somebody else is in luck, and I don't see why we should not----"

Before Fred could finish his sentence both heard the rustling of bushes
behind them. They turned on the instant, and saw a sight which held them
transfixed, for never had they expected to view anything of the kind.

They had read and heard much of grizzly bears. They knew they grew to an
enormous size, and are the most formidable animals found in the great
West, but had they been told that there were such monsters as the one
before them they could not have believed it had it been related by
Hazletine himself.

To Jack and Fred he seemed fully four times the size of the largest
black bear they had ever seen in any zoological garden. Had his legs
been longer, Fred Greenwood would have pronounced him the equal of Jumbo
himself.

Where this Colossus among beasts had come from it was impossible to say,
but the terrifying fact was self-evident that he was advancing to attack
the boys!

He must have caught sight of them as they sat on the rock with their
backs toward him, and, angered at the intrusion, he was sweeping down
upon them like a cyclone, furious and determined to crush them out of
existence.

[Illustration: "He was sweeping down upon them like a cyclone."]

The gait of the animal was awkward, but speedier even than the youths
suspected. He swung along with a swaying motion, and his claws, striking
the flinty rocks as he passed over them, rattled like iron nails. His
vast mouth was open, his long red tongue lolling out, and his white
teeth gleaming. As if no element of terror was to be omitted he uttered