"Dad said he pulled up one of the floor logs and began to dig with his knife and hands. He sunk a hole two or three feet deep and then run a drift under the trap to a big hollow tree that stood just behind it. While the bears were digging in, Dad was digging out. He struck the root of the tree with his tunnel and made an upraise to the inside of the trunk. He climbed up about ten feet and struck into a mass of honey and comb, and crawled through that to a hole about fifty feet from the ground, where he could look out. Just about that time the bears and the lions broke into the trap and began to fight over the bait. The growling and yelling were fearful, and the air was full of flying fur, bark and chips. While Dad was watching the fight he heard a great scratching and scrambling in the tree beneath him, and he knew that one of the bears had caught the scent of the honey and was following it through his drift and upraise. Dad crawled out through the bee hole, slid down the tree and lit out for home. When he came back with his boys and neighbors he found the trap chock full of dead bears and lions. He cut down the bee tree, killed the bear that was inside and got half a ton of fine honey. That's the way Dad tells it."
"I never told no such dogdurned lie as that since I was born," snorted Dad, "and my boys got me out with a crow-bar."
CHAPTER XVI.
BRAINY BEARS OF THE PECOS.
The people who live on the Pecos, away up in the canyon, almost in the afternoon shadow of Baldy and just this side of the Truchas Peaks, do not assert that the bears of that region are wiser than the bears of any other country on earth, for they are ready to admit that in this wide world are many things concerning which they know nothing. But they have never heard of any bears more thoughtful than the bears of the Pecos, and it is doubtful if anybody else ever has.
No man can associate with bears for any considerable length of time without having it impressed upon him that Ursus Americanus is nobody's fool. Senor Mariano Ortiz of the Upper Pecos affirms upon the faith of a descendant of the Conquistadores that this is so, and he ought to know, for he and the bears have been joint occupants of the ranch for years. There was a time when Senor Ortiz thought the Pecos country admirably adapted to the raising of hogs, but that was before he tried to raise hogs there and before he had learned to appreciate the mental capacities of bears.
Senor Ortiz went down to Pecos town and bought some hogs, drove them up the river, and turned them into his alfalfa field to fatten. They were of genuine thoroughbred razor-back variety, trained down to sprinting form, agile, self-reliant as mules, tougher than braided rawhide, and disorderly in their conduct. They broke through the fence the first night, went up into a quaking asp patch where there was nothing eatable, and had a scrap with two bears who thought Senor Ortiz had invested in edible pork. The hogs were wiry and pugnacious, and the circumstantial evidence plainly indicated that the bears had no walk-over. However, the bears managed to get one emaciated porker after a long chase, and they bit several samples out of him. They didn't devour the whole carcass, and they didn't try pork again for two months.
After a few days, the hogs ceased breaking out of the field, and settled down to the business of laying leaf lard upon their rugged frames, a line of conduct which merited and received the hearty approval of Don Mariano, and, as subsequent events proved, was joyously appreciated by the bears. Don Mariano was fearful that the bears, having discovered the prevalence of pork, would raid his field and introduce difficulties into the business of hog raising, and he watched the drove with some solicitude. But, to his surprise, he missed no pigs.
One evening, just at dusk, Don Mariano saw two bears come out of the woods just above the alfalfa field and waddle calmly down to the fence. He hid behind a tree and watched them. When they reached the fence they stood up and placed their forepaws upon the top rail. Thinking they were about to go a-porking, Don Mariano picked up a club and prepared to stampede them, but they made no move to climb the fence, and he waited to see what their game might be. With their paws upon the rail and their snouts resting lazily upon their paws, like two old farmers discussing the crop prospects, the bears inspected the pigs in clover. One of them presently lifted a hind foot and placed it upon the bottom rail, and Don Mariano was about to break forth with a yell, when he saw that the bear was only getting into a more lazily comfortable position. Then the bear cocked his head to one side and thoughtfully scratched his ear. The hogs were nosing around in the clover, and the whole drove was in full view of the bears. The hogs were still lean and athletic.