Hunting with the Bow and Arrow Part 19

Come!"

Now, there was a pitiful plight. No sane man would venture down such a chasm, impenetrable with thorns, and night descending. So we built a beacon fire and waited for dawn. All during the long dark hours we heard the distant appeal of the hounds, and we slept little.

At the first rays of dawn we took a hasty meal, fed our horses, and stripping ourselves of every unnecessary accoutrement, we prepared to descend the canyon. Our bows and quivers we left behind because it would have been impossible to drag them through the jungle. Ferguson carried only his Colt pistol; I took my hunting knife.

Having surveyed the topography carefully, we attacked the problem at its most available angle and slid from view. We literally dived beneath the brush. For more than two hours we wormed our way down the face of the mountain, crawling like moles at the base of the overhanging thickets of poison oak, wild lilac, chamise, sage, manzanita, hazel and buckthorn. At last we reached the depth of the canyon and, finding a little water, we bathed our sweat-grimed faces and cooled off.

No sound of the dogs was heard, but pressing forward we followed the boulder-strewn bottom of the creek for a mile or more, almost despairing of ever finding them, when suddenly we came upon a strange sight. There was the pack in a circle about a big reclining oak. They were voiceless and utterly exhausted, but sat watching a huge lion crouched on a great overhanging limb of the tree. The moment we appeared they raised a feeble, hoa.r.s.e yelp of delight. The panther turned his head, saw us, sprang from the tree with a prodigious bound, landed on the side hill, tore down the canyon, and leaped over a precipice below.

The dogs, heartened by our presence, with instant accord charged after the lion. When they came to the precipitous drop in the bed of the stream, they whined a second, ran back and forth, then mounted the lateral wall, circled sidewise and, by a detour, gained the ground below. We ran and looked over. The drop was at least thirty feet. The cat had taken it without hesitation, but we were absolutely stalled.

Even if we had cared to take the risk of the descent, we saw so many similar drops beyond that the situation was hopeless. The dogs having lost their voices, we were at a great disadvantage. So we returned to the tree to rest and meditate.

There we saw the evidence of the long vigil of the night. All about its base were little nests, where the tired dogs had bedded down and kept their weary watch. Their incessant barking had served to keep the cougar treed, but it cost them a temporary loss of voice. Poor devils, they had our admiration and sympathy.

At noon, hearing nothing from the hounds, we decided to return to camp.

If coming down was hard, going up was herculean. We crawled on hands and knees, dragged ourselves by projecting roots, panted, rested, and worked again. After a three-hours' struggle we came out upon a rough ledge of granite, a mile below the spot at which we aimed, but near enough to the top to permit us, after a little more brush fighting, to gain our camp and lie down, too fatigued to eat.

For another day we remained at this place, hoping that the dogs would return, but in vain. At last we decided to pack up and go around a ten-mile detour and work up the outlet of the canyon. We left a mess of food in several piles for the dogs should they return, and knew they could follow our horses' tracks if they came to camp.

But our detour was futile. We lost all signs of our pack and returned to our headquarters to await results.

It was on this homeward journey that we saw the lion of Pico Blanco, and had to let him slip.

Ten days later, two weak, emaciated hounds came into camp, an old veteran and a young dog that trailed after him as if tied with a rope.

He had followed him to save his life, and for days after he could not be separated without whining with fear.

We fed them carefully and nursed them back to health. But these were all of the five to appear. Old Belle, the greatest fighter of them all, was gone. She must have met her death at the claws of the cougar, for nothing else could keep her. This ended that particular lion hunt.

In our travels over California in search for cougars, we have picked up more tales than trails of the big cats.

Just before one of my visits to Gorda, on the Monterey Coast, a panther visited the Mansfield ranch in broad daylight. Jasper being up on the mountainside after deer, his wife, left at home with the two little children, noticed a very large lion out in the pasture back of the house. It wandered among the cattle in a most unconcerned manner and did not even cause a stir. While it did not approach any of the cows very closely, they seemed to be not in the least alarmed. For half an hour or more it stayed in the neighborhood of the house, where Mrs.

Mansfield locked herself in and waited for her husband's return. It was not until evening, and too late to track the beast, that Jasper came home. So no capture was made.

Some time before this, one of the hired hands on the ranch was going to his cabin in the dusk; and swinging his hand idly to catch the tops of tall gra.s.s by the side of the path, he suddenly touched something warm and soft. Instantly he grasped a handful of the substance. At the same moment some sort of an animal bounded off in the dark. Holding fast to the material in his hand, he ran back to the farmhouse and found his fist full of lion hair. To say that he was startled, puts it very mildly. Apparently one of these beasts had been crouched on a log by the side of his path, waiting for something to turn up. The hired man took a lantern home with him after that.

At another ranch on the Big Sur River, one of the little boys called to his mother that there was a funny sort of a "big dog" out in the pasture. His mother paid no attention to it, but a diminutive pet black and tan started an a.s.sault on the animal in question. The lion and the dog disappeared in the brush. Presently the canine barking ceased and the small boy wondered what had become of his valiant companion. In a few minutes he heard a plaintive whine up in a near-by tree, and running to its base he found that the panther had seized his pet by the nape of the neck and climbed a tall fir with him. The boy ran for his father, working in the fields, who, bringing his rifle, dispatched the panther. As it fell from the tree, the little dog clung to the upper limbs, and stayed at the top. Nothing they could do would coax him down. The fir was one difficult to climb, so to save time the man took an ax and felled the tree, which, falling gently against another, precipitated the canine hero to the ground without harm. Later I had the pleasure of shaking his paw and congratulating him on his bravery.

After many futile attempts, at last our opportunity to get a _Felis Concolor_ arrived. We received word from a certain ranger station in Tuolumne County that a mountain lion was killing sheep and deer in the immediate vicinity, and having the promise of a well trained pack, Arthur Young and I gathered our archery tackle and started from San Francisco at night in an automobile. We traveled until the small hours of the morning, then lay down on the side of the road to take a short sleep; and rising at the first gray of dawn, sped on our way.

We reached the Sierras by sun-up and began to climb. At noon we met our guide above Italian Bar, and prepared for an evening hunt. This, however, was as unsatisfactory as evening hunts usually are.

A morning expedition the next day only brought out the fact that our lion had left the country. News of his activities twelve miles further up the mountains having been obtained, we gathered our bows, arrows, and dogs and departed for this region. Here we found a b.l.o.o.d.y record of his work. More than two hundred goats had been killed by the big cat in the past year. In fact, the rancher thought that several panthers were at work. Goats were taken from beneath the shepherd's nose, and as he turned in one direction, another goat would be killed behind him. It seemed impossible to apprehend the villain; their dogs were useless.

Equipped for rough camping, we soon planned our morning excursion and bedded down for rest.

At 3 o'clock we waked, ate a meager breakfast, and hit the trail up the mountain. We knew the general range of our cougar. It is necessary in all his tracking to get in the field while the dew is on the ground and before the sun dissipates it, also before the goats obliterate the tracks.

Arrived at the crest of the ridge, we struck a well-defined goat trail, and soon the fresh tracks of a lion were discovered. Our dogs took up the scent at once and we began to travel at a rapid pace.

Here again, one must have a good pair of legs. If automobiles, elevators, and general laziness have not ruined your powers of locomotion, you may follow the dogs; otherwise, you had best stay at home.

At first we walk, then we trot, and when with a leap the hounds start in full cry, we race. Regardless of five thousand feet of alt.i.tude, regardless of brush, rocks, and dizzy cliffs, we follow at a breakneck pace. I don't know where our breath comes from in these trials. We just have to run; in fact, we have planned to run on our hands when our legs play out. With pounding hearts we surge ahead. "Keep the dogs within hearing!" "It can't last long!" But this time we come to a sudden halt on a rocky slide. We've lost the scent. The dogs circle and backtrack and work with feverish haste. The sun has risen, and up the mountain side comes a band of goats led by a single shepherd dog--no man in sight. We shout to the dog to steer his rabble away, but on they come, and obliterate our trail with a thousand hoofprints and a cloud of dust.

The sun then comes out, and our day is done. No felis this time.

So we scout the country for information to be used later, and return to camp to drown our sorrow in food.

This was my first knowledge that a dog could be placed in charge of a flock of sheep or goats. It seems that these little sheep dogs, not even collies, but some s.h.a.ggy little plebeians, are given full charge of the band. They lead them out to pasture, guard them, and keep them together during the day and bring them home at night. They will, when properly instructed, take a band of goats out for a week on a long route, and bring them all safely home again. At least, they used to do this until the lion appeared on the scene.

That evening we asked the rancher to lock his goats in the corral till noon.

Next morning we rose again in time to see the morning star glitter with undimmed glory. Up the trail we mounted, the dogs eager for the chase.

An old owl in a hollow tree asked us again and again who we were; all else was silent in the woods.

Saving our strength, we arrived quietly on the upper ridges and waited for the dawn. Way down below us in the canyon we could smell the faint incense of our camp-fire. The morning breeze was just beginning to breathe in the trees. The birds awoke with little whispered confidences, small twitterings and chirps. A faint lavender tint melted the stars in the eastern sky. Shadows crept beneath the trees, and we knew it was time to start.

Just as the light defined the margins of the trail, we picked up in the grayness the track of a lion. Strange to say, the dogs had not smelled it, but when we pointed to the footprint in the dust, which was apparently none too fresh, they took up the work of tracking. It is astonishing to see how a dog can tell which way a track leads. If in doubt, he runs quickly back and forth on the scent, and thus gauges the way the animal has progressed. A mediocre dog cannot do this, but we had dogs with college educations.

Traveling carefully and at a moderate pace, we came to an open knoll in the forest. Here in the ferns our pack circled about us as if the cat had been doing a circus stunt, and they seemed confused. Later on we found that our feline friend had been experimenting with a porcupine and learned another lesson in natural history.

Suddenly the leader sniffed at a fallen tree where, doubtless, the cat had perched, then with a ringing bay, the hound clamped his tail close to his rump and left in a streak of yellow light. The rest of the pack leaped into full cry.

We were off on a hot track. Oh, for the wings of a bird! Trained as Young and I were to desperate running, this game taxed us to the utmost. First we climbed the knoll, deep in ferns and mountain misery, then we dashed over the crest, tore through manzanita brush, thickets of young cedar and buckthorn, over ledges of lava rock, down deep declivities, among giant oaks, cedars, and pines. As we ran we grasped our ready strung bows in one hand and the flapping quivers in the other.

You would not think that at this time we could take note of the fragrant shrubs and pine needles beneath our feet, but I smelled them as we pa.s.sed in flight, and they revived me to renewed energy. On we rushed, only to lose the sound of the dogs. Then we listened and caught it down the hill below us. Again we hurdled barriers of brush, took long sliding leaps down the treacherous shale and ran breathless to the shade of a great oak.

There above our heads was the lion. Oh, the beauty of that beast!

Heaving and giddy with exertion, we saw a wonderful sight, a great tawny, buff-colored body crouched on a limb, grace and power in every outline. A huge, soft cylindrical tail swung slowly back and forth.

Luminous eyes gazed at us in utmost calm, a cold calculating calm. He watched and waited our next move, waited with his great muscles tense for action.

We retreated, not only to get out of his reach, but to gain a better shooting position. As we did this, he gave a lithe leap to a higher limb and shielded himself as best he could behind the boughs of the tree.

From our position, his chest and throat were visible through a triangular s.p.a.ce in the branches, not more than a foot across. We must shoot through this. His att.i.tude was so huddled that his head hung over his shoulder.

Young and I caught our breath, drew our arrows from their quivers, nocked them, and set ourselves in the archer's "stable stand." We drew together and, at a mutual thought, shot together. Because of our unsteady condition the arrows flew a trifle wild. Mine buried itself in the lion's shoulder. Young's. .h.i.t him in the nose.

He reared and struck at this latter shaft, then, not dislodging it, began swaying back and forth while with both front paws he fought the arrow.

While he thrashed about thus in the tree top, we nocked two more arrows and shot. We both missed the brute. Young's flew off into the next state, and if you ever go up into Tuolumne County, you will find mine buried deep in the heart of an oak.

Just as we nocked a third arrow, he freed himself from the offending shaft in his muzzle, raised his fore-paws upon a limb and prepared to leap. In that movement he bared the white hair of his throat and chest, and like a flash, two keen arrows were driven through his heart area.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ARTHUR YOUNG AND HIS COUGAR]

[Ill.u.s.tration: OUR FIRST MOUNTAIN LION]