On reaching the lower end of the slope, and regaining their feet, they turned and looked back up the gorge. The bear had arrived at the upper end; and was standing with his fore feet projected over the edge, and resting upon the snow. He appeared to be undecided, as to whether he should come down after them, or give up the pursuit. He was within easy range of a bullet; and they bethought them of reloading and giving him a fresh volley; when, to their chagrin, they discovered that the barrels of their guns were filled with snow—which had got into them during the descent.
While lamenting this unfortunate accident—in the full belief that they would now lose the bear—they saw the animal make a strange movement. It was forward, and towards them—as if he had made up his mind to charge down the slope; but they soon perceived that this could not be his intention: for as he came gliding on, sometimes his head, and sometimes his stern, was foremost; and it was evident that instead of the movement being a voluntary act on his part, it was quite the contrary. The fact was, that the bullets which they had fired into him had drawn the life’s blood out of his veins; and having stood too long on the sloping edge of the snow, he had fallen through feebleness; and was now tumbling down the ravine, without strength enough to stay his descent.
In another instant he lay stretched almost at the feet of the hunters; for the impetus imparted to his huge carcass in the descent, had brought it with such a “whack” against a large rock, as to deprive him of whatever either of blood or breath there had been left in his body.
The hunters, however, made sure of this, by drawing their long knives, and making an additional vent or two between his ribs—thus securing themselves against all risk of his resuscitation.
They had now finished with the Himalayan bears of known and unknown kinds; but Alexis learnt enough from hunters, whom they had encountered during their sojourn in these mountains, to convince him that great confusion exists among naturalists as to the different species and varieties that inhabit the Himalayan range. Of the “snow bear” itself, a variety exists in the mountains of Cashmere; which, as far as Alexis could learn, was very different from the kind they had killed. The Cashmirian variety is of a deep reddish-brown colour, much longer in the muzzle than the “snow bear,” and also a more dangerous antagonist to man—being a brute of eminently carnivorous propensity and savage disposition.
“It is quite probable,” remarks Alexis, in his journal, “that instead of three kinds of bears inhabiting the Himalayan range, twice that number of ‘species’—or at all events, of permanent varieties—may be found within the extensive area covered by these stupendous mountains.”