Cameron and Joe stood looking at him in a sort of wondering admiration.

“We’d better put a ball in him,” suggested Joe after a time.  “Mayhap the chain won’t stand sich tugs long.”

“True, Joe; if it break, we might get an ugly nip before we killed him.”

So saying Cameron fired into the wolf’s head and killed it.  It was found, on examination, that four wolves had been in the traps, but the rest had escaped.  Two of them, however, had gnawed off their paws and left them lying in the traps.

After this the big wolves did not trouble them again.  The same afternoon a bear-hunt was undertaken, which well-nigh cost one of the Iroquois his life.  It happened thus:—­

While Cameron and Joe were away after the white wolves, Henri came floundering into camp tossing his arms like a maniac, and shouting that “seven bars wos be down in de bush close by!” It chanced that this was an idle day with most of the men, so they all leaped on their horses, and taking guns and knives sallied forth to give battle to the bears.

Arrived at the scene of action, they found the seven bears busily engaged in digging up roots, so the men separated in order to surround them, and then closed in.  The place was partly open and partly covered with thick bushes into which a horseman could not penetrate.

The moment the bears got wind of what was going forward they made off as fast as possible, and then commenced a scene of firing, galloping, and yelling that defies description!  Four out of the seven were shot before they gained the bushes; the other three were wounded, but made good their retreat.  As their places of shelter, however, were like islands in the plain, they had no chance of escaping.

The horsemen now dismounted and dashed recklessly into the bushes, where they soon discovered and killed two of the bears; the third was not found for some time.  At last an Iroquois came upon it so suddenly that he had not time to point his gun before the bear sprang upon him and struck him to the earth, where it held him down.

Instantly the place was surrounded by eager men; but the bushes were so thick, and the fallen trees among which the bear stood were so numerous, that they could not use their guns without running the risk of shooting their companion.  Most of them drew their knives and seemed about to rush on the bear with these; but the monster’s aspect, as it glared around, was so terrible that they held back for a moment in hesitation.

At this moment Henri, who had been at some distance engaged in the killing of one of the other bears, came rushing forward after his own peculiar manner.  “Ah! fat is eet—­hay? de bar no go under yit?”

Just then his eye fell on the wounded Iroquois with the bear above him, and he uttered a yell so intense in tone that the bear himself seemed to feel that something decisive was about to be done at last.  Henri did not pause, but with a flying dash he sprang like a spread eagle, arms and legs extended, right into the bear’s bosom.  At the same moment he sent his long hunting-knife down into its heart.  But Bruin is proverbially hard to kill, and although mortally wounded, he had strength enough to open his jaws and close them on Henri’s neck.