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Show JAMES P. BECKWOURTH. 513 " Shoot, Jim ! shoot quick ! " I could not help laughing to have saved my life, as he turned from side to side, though his situation was a critical one. I soon got in a favorable position, and put a ball in the animal's head, just behind the ear, when he liberated the horse and his rider, falling on his back apparently stone dead. There is a story, remembered by the mountaineers, of a person named Key ere. l-Ie was a man who never exceeded one hundred pounds in weight, but was clear grit, what little there was of him. l-Ie went out one day alone, and his horse came back in the evening without his rider, and we thought that the Indians had made sure of poor l{eyere's scalp. The next morning a small party of us started on the horse's trail, and found Keyere lying beside a large dead grizz}y bear. Keyere was horribly mutilated and insensible, but still alive, and must have soon died if no one had come to his rescue . . We took him to camp, and nursed him with all pos-sible care. When he recovered sufficiently to tell his tale, his story was received with shouts of laughter, and was rehearsed as a wonderful joke fr01n camp to camp. Keyere stated that, when he saw the grizzly, he got from his horse to shoot him, but unfortunately only wounded the animal. The bear (so l{eyere says) caught hold of him, and commenced a regular roughand- tumble fight; finally Keyere got a good lick at the bear's head, knocked him down with his fist, and then attempted to run away. The bear, however, was too quick, when Key ere, becoming desperate, seized the beast by the tongue, drew his knife, and stabbed the creature to the heart ! Improbable as is the tale, it was a singular fact, Y2 |