The last benches of that ridge taxed my waning strength.  I had to step up, climb up, pull myself up, by hand and knee and body.  My rifle grew to weigh a ton.  My cartridge belt was a burden of lead around my waist.  If I had been hot and wet below in the thicket I wondered what I grew on the last steps of this ridge.  Yet even the toil and the pain held a keen pleasure.  I did not analyze my feelings then, but it was good to be there.

The rim-rock came out to a point above me, seeming unscalable, all grown over with brush and lichen, and stunted spruce.  But by hauling myself up, and crawling here, and winding under bridges of rock there, and holding to the brush, at last, panting and spent, I reached the top.

I was ready to drop on the mats of pine needles and lie there, unutterably grateful for rest, when I heard Old Tom baying, deep and ringing and close.  He seemed right under the rim on the side of the ridge opposite to where I had climbed.  I looked around.  There was George’s horse tied to a pine, and farther on my own horse Stockings.

Then I walked to the rim and looked down into the gold and scarlet thicket.  Actually it seemed to me then, and always will seem, that the first object I clearly distinguished was a big black bear standing in an open aisle at the upper reach of the thicket close to the cliff.  He shone black as shiny coal.  He was looking down into the thicket, as if listening to the baying hound.

I could not repress an exclamation of surprise and thrilling excitement, and I uttered it as I raised my rifle.  Just the instant I saw his shining fur through the circle of my rear sight he heard me and jumped, and my bullet missed him.  Like a black flash he was gone around a corner of gray ledge.

“Well!” I ejaculated, suddenly weak.  “After all this long day—­to get a chance like that—­and miss!”

All that seemed left of that long day was the sunset, out of which I could not be cheated by blunders or bad luck.  Westward a glorious golden ball blazed over the rim.  Above that shone an intense belt of color—­Coleridge’s yellow lightning—­and it extended to a bank of cloud that seemed transparent purple, and above all this flowed a sea of purest blue sky with fleecy sails of pink and white and rose, exquisitely flecked with gold.

Lost indeed was I to weariness and time until the gorgeous transformation at last ended in dull gray.  I walked along the rim, back to where I had tied my horse.  He saw me and whinnied before I located the spot.  I just about had strength enough left to straddle him.  And presently through the twilight shadows I caught a bright glimmer of our camp-fire.  Supper was ready; Takahashi grinned his concern away; all the men were waiting for me; and like the Ancient Mariner I told my tale.  As I sat to a bountiful repast regaling myself, the talk of my companions seemed absolutely satisfying.