At dusk we emerged weary from the forest and came into a basin with a meadow of green grass. A more romantic spot for a camp I have never seen—a narrow valley surrounded by high mountains and sheltered by trees. Through the meadow flowed a stream of clear water. Waterfalls dashed over the cliffs and fell into the stream below. We pitched our lodge on a carpet of green moss, near an ancient fir tree and a grove of spruces which sheltered us from the cold winds that sweep down the valley from the snowfields. Soon after we turned our horses loose, I heard a kind of grunting, or roaring whine, answered by the frightened snorts of horses as they galloped away; and the scout shouted: “Hi, there! A grizzly bear! A grizzly bear!” Among the hoofprints of the horses I found the tracks of a huge bear. But he had gone and we got no sight of him. I saw the place where he had been turning over stones hunting for insects and ant eggs, and tearing up the ground after squirrels. At dark a cold wind came down the valley, and we gathered many logs and threw them on our camp-fire, till the big fir tree looked like a specter in the red glow of the flames. Then we lighted our pipes and sat by the fire. The scout had the gift of companionship; and when he talked I always felt at ease. He refreshed me with his knowledge of nature and of the woods, and stimulated my interest in Indians. That night he talked about the bear and said: “In this valley a big grizzly has his range. He has lived here so long, he must now be very old. The Indians know him well and are afraid to shoot at him. He comes boldly into their camps and takes food. He is so big we believe he has supernatural power and call him the ‘Medicine Grizzly.’” After that there was silence for a while. The fire burned low and we sat gazing into the embers. By this time the valley was in darkness; but I saw the rugged outlines of the mountains against the sky, their snowy summits lighted by myriads of brilliant stars. I heard the rippling of the stream, the sound of the waterfall and the tinkle of the horse-bell where our herd were feeding. Then a wailing cry, probably the voice of some lynx or wolverine, arose from the depths of the forest. It made me think of the big grizzly in whose range we were camped. Little did I realize I would soon meet him face to face. For several days the scout and I hunted on the mountains. We climbed to timber-line with its dwarfed and distorted trees. Above were the rocky heights and below the dark forest. In the front line were trees only a few feet in height, many hundreds of years old. Some were pushed partly over by storms and had all their branches pointing one way. They were battered and twisted by a thousand storms and overweighted by heavy snows. But we found no game, not even tracks.