and after refreshing his empty stomach with a
portion of the flesh, he placed the carcass in one end of the canoe. It
was his invariable custom to sleep in his canoe at night, moored to the
shore, and once when he had laid in a supply of venison he was startled
in his sleep by the tramping of something in the bushes on the bank.
Tramp! tramp! tramp! went the footsteps, as they approached the canoe.
He thought at first it might be an Indian that had found out his
locality, but he knew that it could not be; a savage would not approach
him in that careless manner. Although there was beautiful starlight, yet
the trees and the dense undergrowth made it very dark on the bank of the
river, close to which he lay. He always adopted the precaution of tying
his canoe with a piece of rawhide about twenty feet long, which allowed
it to swing from the bank at that distance; he did this so that in case
of an emergency he might cut the string, and glide off without making
any noise. As the sound of the footsteps grew more distinct, he
presently observed a huge grizzly bear coming down to the water and
swimming for the canoe. The great animal held his head up as if scenting
the venison. The captain snatched his axe as the most available means
to defend himself in such a scrape, and stood with it uplifted, ready to
drive it into the brains of the monster. The bear reached the canoe, and
immediately put his fore paws upon the hind end of it, nearly turning
it over. The captain struck one of the brute's feet with the edge of
the axe, which made him let go with that foot, but he held on with
the other, and he received this time a terrific blow on the head, that
caused him to drop away from the canoe entirely. Nothing more was seen
of the bear, and the captain thought he must have sunk in the stream and
drowned. He was evidently after the fresh meat, which he scented from
a great distance. In the canoe the next morning there were two of the
bear's claws, which had been cut off by the well-directed blow of the
axe. These were carefully preserved by Williams for many years as a
trophy which he was fond of exhibiting, and the history of which he
always delighted to tell.

As he was descending the river with his peltries, which consisted of
one hundred and twenty-five beaver-skins, besides some of the otter and
other smaller animals, he overtook three Kansas Indians, who were also
in a canoe going down the river, as he learned from them, to some