“I think I missed my second shot,” went on the Colonel, “for he was bounding up and down so over those bowlders, rearing and bellowing like an express train as he came. But my third bullet took him square between the eyes and doubled him up like the punch of a battering-ram. He went over in a complete somersault, Sid. Did he stay down? Any other creature in the world, even an African lion, would have been scuppered by that shot, but that mountain of beef got up and came right on, like a ton of hate. You know something of the ferocity of that grizzly charge, Sid, and you, too, Scotty! “The next shot was a heart shot and I was mighty careful of it, for I had only about forty yards left----” Big John nodded. “Shore ’twas a center shot, Colonel. That heart was shot to ribbons when I took her out. I seen whar the bullet went in, an’ got her out to see what ye done to him. Oughtta hev stopped him, right thar.” “Not for a minute! He squalled like a stuck pig, but hardly slackened. I fired my last bullet at fifteen feet and then jumped back from the cleft in the bowlders where I was hidden. He cleared the distance in one bound and I saw that big right paw of his coming down on me like the trunk of a tree. It smashed the rifle out of my hands. I felt like a hot iron had ripped me from top to bottom as his claws raked down inside my guard. I went over backward and then Niltci jumped in, from God knows where, and his knife flashed up and into the bear’s side. That’s the last thing I know about it, for I saw stars as my head struck the rocks.” “That blow knocked you about ten feet, Father, over the rock and into a little hollow behind your hide,” said Sid. “As for Niltci, a back-hand swipe from the bear splintered his leg like a straw. There wasn’t a claw mark on him. The old yellow boy must have collapsed where he lay, but he bit off and broke every pinyon tree in reach before he gave up. Some charge! I’ll match him against any dangerous beast the world over. I’d like to see a bunch of Masai tackle him with spears, the way they do an African lion!--There would be mighty few niggers left after he got through.” The Colonel looked blissfully at the great yellow expanse of fur, tipped with fine white at the end of each hair. “Boys, she’ll about cover the floor of the Den back home!” he exclaimed. “I’ve met a good many bears in my time, but our cavalry troop never got over into southern California, although we heard a good deal about those big demon grizzlies there. Even the modern .35 is not gun enough, I’ll say! The old buckskin pioneers must have had their hands full with them!” Sid now brought up the matter of Major Hinchman’s letter, for it was essential to move quickly about that business.