I washed and dressed, and loaded my guns; and then we got into a sledge, and started.
The sharp frost still continued. It was quiet, and the sun could not be seen. There was a thick mist above us, and hoar-frost still covered everything.
After driving about two miles along the road, as we came near the forest, we saw a cloud of smoke rising from a hollow, and presently reached a group of peasants, both men and women, armed with cudgels.
We got out and went up to them. The men sat roasting potatoes, and laughing and talking with the women.
Damian was there too; and when we arrived the people got up, and Damian led them away to place them in the circle we had made the day before. They went along in single file, men and women, thirty in all. The snow was so deep that we could only see them from their waists upwards. They turned into the forest, and my friend and I followed in their track.
Though they had trodden a path, walking was difficult, but, on the other hand, it was impossible to fall: it was like walking between two walls of snow.
We went on in this way for nearly half a mile, when all at once we saw Damian coming from another direction — running towards us on his snowshoes, and beckoning us to join him. We went towards him, and he showed us where to stand. I took my place, and looked round me.
To my left were tall fir trees, between the trunks of which I could see a good way, and, like a black patch just visible behind the trees, I could see a beater. In front of me was a thicket of young firs, about as high as a man, their branches weighed down and stuck together with snow. Through this copse ran a path thickly covered with snow, and leading straight up to where I stood. The thicket stretched away to the right of me, and ended in a small glade, where I could see Damian placing my comrade.
I examined both my guns, and considered where I had better stand. Three steps behind me was a tall fir.
‘That’s where I’ll stand,’ thought I, ‘and then I can lean my second gun against the tree’; and I moved towards the tree, sinking up to my knees in the snow at each step. I trod the snow down, and made a clearance about a yard square, to stand on. One gun I kept in my hand; the other, ready cocked, I placed leaning up against the tree. Then I unsheathed and replaced my dagger, to make sure that I could draw it easily in case of need.
Just as I had finished these preparations, I heard Damian shouting in the forest:
‘He’s up! He’s up!’
And as soon as Damian shouted, the peasants round the circle all replied in their different voices.
‘Up, up, up! Ou! Ou! Ou!’ shouted the men.
‘Ay! Ay! Ay!’ screamed the women in high. pitched tones.
The bear was inside the circle, and as Damian drove him on, the people all round kept shouting. Only my friend and I stood silent and motionless, waiting for the bear to come towards us. As I stood gazing and listening, my heart beat violently. I trembled, holding my gun fast.
‘Now now,’ I thought. ‘He will come suddenly. I shall aim, fire, and he will drop— ‘
Suddenly, to my left, but at a distance, I heard something falling on the snow. I looked between the tall fir trees, and, some fifty paces off, behind the trunks, saw something big and black. I took aim and waited, thinking:
‘Won’t he come any nearer?’
As I waited I saw him move his ears, turn, and go back; and then I caught a glimpse of the whole of him in profile. He was an immense brute. In my excitement, I fired, and heard my bullet go ‘flop’ against a tree. Peering through the smoke, I saw my bear scampering back into the circle, and disappearing among the trees.
‘Well,’ thought I. ‘My chance is lost. He won’t come back to me. Either my comrade will shoot him, or he will escape through the line of beaters. In any case he won’t give me another chance.’
I reloaded my gun, however, and again stood listening. The peasants were shouting all round, but to the right, not far from where my comrade stood, I heard a woman screaming in a frenzied voice: ‘Here he is! Here he is! Come here, come here! Oh! Oh! Ay! Ay!’
Evidently she could see the bear. I had given up expecting him, and was looking to the right at my comrade. All at once I saw Damian with a stick in his hand, and without his snow-shoes, running along a footpath towards my friend. He crouched down beside him, pointing his stick as if aiming at something, and then I saw my friend raise his gun and aim in the same direction. Crack! He fired.
‘There,’ thought I. ‘He has killed him.’
But I saw that my comrade did not run towards the bear. Evidently he had missed him, or the shot had not taken full effect.
‘The bear will get away,’ I thought. ‘He will go back, but he won’t come a second time towards me. — But what is that?’
Something was coming towards me like a whirlwind, snorting as it came; and I saw the snow flying up quite near me. I glanced straight before me, and there was the bear, rushing along the path through the thicket right at me, evidently beside himself with fear. He was hardly half a dozen paces off, and I could see the whole of him — his black chest and enormous head with a reddish patch.
There he was, blundering straight at me, and scattering the snow about as he came. I could see by his eyes that he did not see me, but, mad with fear, was rushing blindly along; and his path led him straight at the tree under which I was standing. I raised my gun and fired. He was almost upon me now, and I saw that I had missed. My bullet had gone past him, and he did not even hear me fire, but still came headlong towards me. I lowered my gun, and fired again, almost touching his head. Crack! I had hit, but not killed him!
He raised his head, and laying his ears back, came at me, showing his teeth.
I snatched at my other gun, but almost before I had touched it, he had down at me and, knocking me over into the snow, had passed right over me.
‘Thank goodness, he has left me,’ thought I.
I tried to rise, but something pressed me down, and prevented my getting up. The bear’s rush had carried him past me, but he had turned back, and had fallen on me with the whole weight of his body. I felt something heavy weighing me down, and something warm above my face, and I realized that he was drawing my whole face into his mouth. My nose was already in it, and I felt the heat of it, and smelt his blood.
He was pressing my shoulders down with his paws so that I could not move: all I could do was to draw my head down towards my chest away from his mouth, trying to free my nose and eyes, while he tried to get his teeth into them. Then I felt that he had seized my forehead just under the hair with the teeth of his lower jaw, and the flesh below my eyes with his upper jaw, and was closing his teeth. It was as if my face were being cut with knives. I struggled to get away, while he made haste to close his jaws like a dog gnawing. I managed to twist my face away, but he began drawing it again into his mouth.
‘Now,’ thought I, ‘my end has come!’
Then I felt the weight lifted, and looking up, I saw that he was no longer there. He had jumped off me and run away.
When my comrade and Damian had seen the bear knock me down and begin worrying me, they rushed to the rescue. My comrade, in his haste, blundered, and instead of following the trodden path, ran into the deep snow and fell down. While he was struggling out of the snow, the bear was gnawing at me. But Damian just as he was, without a gun, and with only a stick in his hand, rushed along the path shouting:
‘He’s eating the master! He’s eating the master!’
And as he ran, he called to the bear:
‘Oh you idiot! What are you doing? Leave off! Leave off!’
The bear obeyed him, and leaving me ran away. When I rose, there was as much blood on the snow as if a sheep had been killed, and the flesh hung in rags above my eyes, though in my excitement I felt no pain.
My comrade had come up by this time, and the other people collected round: they looked at my wound, and put snow on it. But I, forgetting about my wounds, only asked:
‘Where’s the bear? Which way has he gone?’
Suddenly I heard:
‘Here he is! Here he is!’
And we saw the bear again running at us. We seized our guns, but before any one had time to fire he had run past. He had grown ferocious, and wanted to gnaw me again, but seeing so many people he took fright. We
