Bears I Have Met—and Others

by Allen Kelly

CHAPTER VIII.

IN THE BIG SNOW.

The winter of 1889-90 is memorable in California as the winter of "the big snow." In the latter part of January the Central Pacific line over the Sierra Nevada was blockaded, and three or four passenger trains were imprisoned in the drifts for more than two weeks. Passing through the blockade and over the range afoot, I walked at times above the tops of the telegraph poles, and think it no exaggeration to estimate the depth of snow at the higher altitudes at 25 feet. Drifts in the canyons must have been more than double the depth of the snow on a level. The storm was general and the snowfall throughout the mountain region was extraordinary, not only for quantity but for rapidity. It can snow more inches to the hour in the high Sierra than feet to the week anywhere else, and the big storm of 1890 broke all previous records.

Miners' cabins in the gulches and hunters' shacks on the mountains were buried in a night and the occupants had to tunnel their way out. Deer fled from the slopes down into secluded glens which had been their safe refuge from Sierra storms before, but the white death followed them and softly folded its feathery wings about them. In the spring the dead deer were found in hundreds where they had "yarded" safely through many winters before the big snow. Warm weather before the storm had brought the bears out of their holes and set them to foraging for grub. The snow fell lightly and no crust formed for some time, and bruin could not wallow through it. The best he could do was to get under the lee of a log or ledge, take another nap and nurse his inconvenient appetite. Being a philosopher, bruin did the best he could and trusted the god of the wild things to do the rest.

Upon the long western slope of a big sprawling mountain in Sierra county a Grizzly dam and two gaunt cubs of the vintage of '89 were caught in the big snow miles away from the deep gulch in which they had passed the winter. No doubt that dam was weatherwise enough to sense the coming storm in time to have returned to the den, but neither beast nor man could have guessed what a thick blanket of white the gray clouds were about to lay upon the land. When the flakes began to fall thickly Mother Grizzly quit digging roots and turning over rocks, and sought shelter. The long slope was smooth and bare, but down near the foot was a fallen pine with upturned roots, and into the hollow where the roots had been, under the lee of the matted mass of fibre and dirt, Mother Grizzly led her babies and there made her bed for the night. It was a longer night than the old bear expected. It lasted until the next day's westering sun made a pale, bluish glimmer through the upper part of the drift that covered the fallen tree and filled up the hollow. The warmth of their bodies had kept an open space around the bears, and the upturned roots of the pine had prevented the snow from piling high directly over them, while causing it to drift and form an enclosing barrier in front of the shallow pit made by the uprooting of the tree. Mother Grizzly arose and struggled toward the dim glimmer of light, but she could not break her way out. The snow was light and dry and would not pack, and her buffetings only brought a feathery smother down upon her and the cubs. All she accomplished was to let down the frail roofing of the den and get a glimpse of the sky. She tried to climb up the drift, but sank out of sight and had to back out of the smother. Digging was futile, for the snow offered scarcely more resistance than foam.

So Mother Grizzly gave up her attempt to escape and busied herself with making the hollow as comfortable as possible for a long stay. She scraped down to the dirt and packed the snow about the sides of the lair, stowed the cubs against the back of the den and curled herself in front of them and waited for better times to come.

It is a proverb of the Spaniards that "who sleeps, dines," and bears attest its truth, for it is their experience through the long, cold weeks of winter, when the snow is deep and no food is to be got at. Doubtless the old she bear was content to go to sleep again and forget her hunger, but it may be supposed that the cubs had not learned the philosophy of necessity, and kept her awake with fretful demands which she could not satisfy. Had the family remained holed up in the winter den and not been tempted out by mild weather to break the long fast, probably the desire for food would have remained dormant, but the taste of food awakened appetite, and exercise sharpened it and created insistent necessity for its satisfaction. The normal period of hibernation having passed, dreams were no longer acceptable substitutes for dinner. So the hungry, worrying cubs would not let their dam sleep, and she soon became as ravenous as they and impatient of imprisonment.

Every day Mother Grizzly tried the barrier to find a way out, but for more than two weeks the snow was without a crust that would sustain the weight of a dog, and she could only flounder into the drift a few feet and struggle out again. Then a light drizzle of rain came, and the next night there was a sharper tingle in the air, a promise of cold weather, and crust began to form. In a day or two more it would be firm enough to travel upon, and the old Grizzly would lead her starving cubs down into the foothills and hunt for a stray calf or a sheep with which to feed them.

The big snow obliterated mountain roads and trails, and the mail was carried to many of the smaller mountain settlements by men on snowshoes, who took the shortest feasible routes and found smooth traveling a dozen or fifteen feet above the rough, rock-strewn ground. A Sierra carrier on skis—the long, wooden Norwegian snowshoes—with a letter pouch strapped to his shoulders, was tempted by the light crust to leave the ridge and shorten his journey by making a cut-off down the long, smooth slope. A minute's swift rush down that slope would save hours of weary plodding above the heads of the gulches.

The carrier studied the stretch of gleaming white carefully to select his course, and determined on a line passing a little below the roots of the fallen pine, which were indicated by a slight fold in the blanket of snow. Setting his steel-shod staff under his left arm pit to serve as brake and rudder and throwing his weight upon it, the carrier ranged his skis parallel, the right in advance a few inches, fixed his attention upon the range mark he had chosen, gave a slight push with the staff and got under way. The crust bore his weight easily, and in two seconds he was gliding swiftly. In five seconds more he was speeding like an arrow from the bow, and the ringing of the steel staff point against the crust arose in a high clear note above the grating sound of the sliding skis.

Mother Grizzly heard the strange sound, which was unlike anything of which she knew the meaning, and cuffing the whining cubs into instant silence, she started cautiously up the barrier to see what was going on or what danger menaced. Her frequent attempts to get out of the hole had made an inclined trench, which came to the surface a few yards from the protruding tree roots, and when she reached the upper end and put her head above the crust she saw a man rushing down the mountain straight toward her with the speed of a falling stone.

The green glint came into the grizzly's eyes, her teeth clashed together in quick, sharp strokes, like the chattering of a chilled bather, and she lunged forward and upward to meet the charge. If the man saw her at all, it was too late to swerve from his course or swing his staff forward for a weapon. His right ski passed under the bear's foreleg and he flew headlong over her, hurtled through the air and crashed through the snow crust a dozen yards beyond her. One of the skis was broken and torn from his foot, and even if his leg had not been broken he would have been helpless where he fell.

[Illustration: She Lunged Forward to Meet the Charge.]

Mother Grizzly and the starving cubs broke their fast, and two or three days later they went away over the frozen snow to the foothills. The men who went out in search of the missing carrier, and followed his trail to the fallen pine, brought back the mail pouch and something in a grain sack. They told me what they found, but it was not a pleasing tale and it is best that it be not retold.