the hill to his lair, and with this store of food he again lay down to nurse his wounds.  Though painful, they were not serious, and within a week or so Grizzly Jack was as well as ever and roaming the woods about Fallen Leaf Lake and farther south and east, for he was extending his range as he grew—­the king was coming to his kingdom.  In time he met others of his kind and matched his strength with theirs.  Sometimes he won and sometimes lost, but he kept on growing as the months went by, growing and learning and adding to his power.

Kellyan had kept track of him and knew at least the main facts of his life, because he had one or two marks that always served to distinguish him.  A study of the tracks had told of the round wound in the front foot and the wound in the hind foot.  But there was another:  the hunter had picked up the splinters of bone at the camp where he had fired at the Bear, and, after long doubt, he guessed that he had broken a tusk.  He hesitated to tell the story of hitting a tooth and hind toe at the same shot till, later, he had clearer proof of its truth.

No two animals are alike.  Kinds which herd have more sameness than those that do not, and the Grizzly, being a solitary kind, shows great individuality.  Most Grizzlies mark their length on the trees by rubbing their backs, and some will turn on the tree and claw it with their fore paws; others hug the tree with fore paws and rake it with their hind claws.  Gringo’s peculiarity of marking was to rub first, then turn and tear the trunk with his teeth.

It was on examining one of the Bear trees one day that Kellyan discovered the facts.  He had been tracking the Bear all morning, had a fine set of tracks in the dusty trail, and thus learned that the rifle-wound was a toe-shot in the hind foot, but his fore foot of the same side had a large round wound, the one really made by the cow’s horn.  When he came to the Bear tree where Gringo had carved his initials, the marks were clearly made by the Bear’s teeth, and one of the upper tusks was broken off, so the evidence of identity was complete.

“It’s the same old B’ar,” said Lan to his pard.

They failed to get sight of him in all this time, so the partners set to work at a series of Bear-traps.  These are made of heavy logs and have a sliding door of hewn planks.  The bait is on a trigger at the far end; a tug on this lets the door drop.  It was a week’s hard work to make four of these traps.  They did not set them at once, for no Bear will go near a thing so suspiciously new-looking.  Some Bears will not approach one till it is weather-beaten and gray.  But they removed all chips and covered the newly cut wood with mud, then rubbed the inside with stale meat, and hung a lump of ancient venison on the trigger of each trap.

They did not go around for three days, knowing that the human smell must first be dissipated, and then they found but one trap sprung—­the door down.  Bonamy became greatly excited, for they had crossed the Grizzly’s track close by.  But Kellyan had been studying the dust and suddenly laughed aloud.