Philip only laughed and called loudly to his comrades to get the guns. At the sound of his voice the she-bear turned about, and, seeing her cub in the tree, began scrambling up after it. At this quite unexpected turn in affairs Philip began to climb higher, no longer disposed to laugh, while Bromley jumped down on the opposite side of the cabin and secured the carbines, one of which he passed up to Lieutenant Coleman on the roof. Now, Coleman had a clear eye and a steady hand with a gun, and would have hit the heart of the bear with his bullet like the handiest old sport of the woods, but as the animal crouched in the crotch of the tree a great limb covered her side and head. By this time Philip was as high as he dared to climb. The cub from the ashes was hugging the same slender limb, breathing on his naked feet, and the old bear, with bristling hair and erect ears, was growling where she lay, and putting out her great claws to go aloft after Philip. This was the critical moment, when Bromley ran under the tree and shot the bear. His ball went crashing into her shoulder instead of between the ribs behind, as he had meant it should. It was just as well, he thought, when he saw her come rolling along the trunk to the ground as if she were thrice dead. If he had only known bears a little better, he would probably have exchanged carbines and kept a safe distance from the animal; and even then, in the end, it might have been worse for him. He had only broken her big, shaggy shoulder, and as he came near to the wounded brute she rose suddenly on her hind feet and dealt him such a whack with her sound paw as nearly broke his ribs and sent him rolling over and over on the ground. Bear and man were so mixed in the air that even Coleman feared to risk a shot. Poor Bromley, crippled and bleeding at the nose, lay almost helpless on his back under the tree, and in this state the maddened bear charged furiously on him, her foaming and bloody jaws extended. Half stunned and more than half beaten, he had retained his cool nerve and a firm grip on his empty carbine; and as the bear came over him, with all his remaining strength he crushed the clumsy weapon into her open mouth like a huge bit. She was so near that he felt her hot breath on his face, and saw her flaming eyes through the blood which nearly blinded his own. Bromley felt his strength going. The breath was nearly crushed out of his body by the weight of the bear, baffled for an instant by the mass of iron between her jaws. Philip, drawing up his toes from the cub, forgot his own peril as he gazed down in terror at the struggle below. At the moment which he believed was Bromley's last a quick report rang out from the roof, and the great bear rolled heavily to one side, with Lieutenant Coleman's bullet in her heart. [Illustration: "SHE ROSE SUDDENLY ON HER HIND FEET AND DEALT HIM SUCH A WHACK AS NEARLY BROKE HIS RIBS."]