(The black-tailed or “mule” deer is one of the largest and most gracefully beautiful animals to be found in the hunting-grounds of the far west.)
A few minutes afterwards there came up out of that gorge a sound that made our heroes start, and stand to their rifles, while their hearts almost stood still with the dread of some terrible danger. It was not for themselves but for Ralph they feared. It was a deep, appalling, coughing roar, or bellow—the bellow of some mighty beast that has started up in anger. A minute more, and Ralph, breathless and bareheaded, with trailing rifle, rushed into the open, closely followed by an immense grizzly bear. He was on his hind legs, and in the very act of striking Ralph down with his terrible paw.
The danger was painfully imminent, and for either of his friends to fire was out of the question, so close together were bear and man. But lo! at that very moment, when it seemed as if no power on earth could save Ralph, the grizzly emitted a harsh and angry cry, and turned hastily round to face another assailant. This was no other than Spunkie, the Skye terrier, who had seized on Bruin by the heel. Oh! no mean assailant did the bear find him either. But do not imagine, pray, that this little dog meant to allow himself to be caught by the powerful brute he had tackled. No; and as soon as he had bitten Bruin he drew off far enough away to save his own tiny life. You see, in his very insignificance lay his strength. A dog of Oscar’s size would have been at once grappled and torn in pieces. Feint after feint did the terrier make of again rushing at the grizzly, but meanwhile Ralph had made good his escape, and next minute bullets rained on the grizzly, for Seth’s rang out from the thicket, and McBain’s and Rory’s and Allan’s from the open, so he sank to rise no more.
Ralph determined to learn a lesson from this little adventure; he made up his mind that he would never follow a wounded deer into a thick jungle without, at all events, previously reloading his rifle.
Chapter Eighteen.
Rory Poet, Dreamer, and Merchant-Minstrel—Who Says Shore?—All among the Buffalo—“A Big Shoot”—Preparations for Winter.
“Would you believe it, boys,” said McBain one morning, “that we have been here just two months to-morrow?”
They were seated at breakfast, and had you cast your eye over that table, reader, and seen the dainties and delicious dishes “seated” thereon, as Rory called it, you would hardly have believed you were in a far-off foreign land. Here were cold joints of venison, and pasties of game, and pies of pigeon, and the most delicious fish that ever smoked on a board, to say nothing of eggs of wild fowl and sea-birds, the very colours of which were so charming it seemed a sin to crack the shell. But how Seth basted those broiled fish, or what those fish were, only Seth himself knew. But Seth would be out in a boat in blue water, just as the first breakfast bugle went—and that was Peter and the pipes playing a pibroch—and in five minutes more he was back with the fish—Arctic salmon, our heroes called them, for want of a better name. The life was barely out of them ere they were split down the back, and nailed to a large hard wood board and done before the fire, but Seth himself served them ready to eat. It was a magic performance, and when amber tears from a slice of lemon were shed over it, lo! a dish fit for a king.