At last we were in position.  It is usual to have a second gun, but I had only my rifle and revolver; unfortunately my gun was with my baggage at Maros Vasarhely.  After waiting for some time without hearing anything but the creaking of the pine-trees in the wind, the advance of the beaters was at length audible.  You hear repeated thuds with their axes on the trees, and you know that they are beating up your way.  All at once I heard the unmistakable tread of some heavy four-footed beast.  I held my breath, fearing to betray my presence.  Nearer and nearer came the heavy tread, the branches cracking as the animal broke its way through the thicket.  It must be a bear of the largest size, thought I, with a glow of delight warming up my whole frame at this supreme moment.  I had just raised the rifle to my shoulder, when—­judge my disgust—­when emerging from the thicket I saw a stray ox make his appearance!  I could hardly resist putting a bullet into the stupid brute’s carcass, but I remembered that I should have to pay for that little game.

We moved on to another part of the forest, and the same programme of taking our positions and arranging the course of the beaters was gone through; but we met with no success.  This was the more provoking, because on our return we found the fresh slot of a bear.  He had evidently just saved himself in time; the marks of his claws were quite visible in the soft mud.

These footprints were all we were destined to see, for evening was drawing on, and it was impossible to pursue the sport any farther.  Of course we commenced operations far too late in the day; it was simply ridiculous to begin at such a late hour in the autumn afternoon.  It was very disappointing; but there is so much of mere chance in bear-hunting, that where one man has the luck to kill four or five in a season, another may go on for two years following without getting as much as a shot.

The sportsman will be glad to hear, though the farmer is of quite another mind, that bears, wolves, and wild-boar are increasing very much in the Carpathians generally.  I have mentioned this fact before, but I allude to it again because it was everywhere corroborated.  On all sides this increase is attributed to the tax on firearms, which deters the peasants from keeping them down.  They are often too poor to pay for a shooting licence and the gun-tax.

Toplicza has some warm mineral springs.  Warm water seems to be turned on everywhere in Hungary.  One of these springs is situated close to the river, where a simple kind of bath-house has been constructed.  The water contains iodine.  While at Toplicza I heard that somewhere up in the mountains on the Bukovina side there is a large deposit of sulphur.  The accounts were very vague, but I thought I should like to have a look at the place.  The district was pronounced to be so unsafe, and so many robbers had appeared on the scene lately, that I thought proper to take two men with me; one as a guide, for he had been there before, and a forester armed with a gun.