Book: Hunting with the Bow and Arrow

S >> Saxton Pope >> Hunting with the Bow and Arrow




"There are lots of grizzlies in the park all right, and some of
them are not very wild, but if you get out away from the hotels a
few miles, they are not going to come up and present their
broadsides to you at thirty yards. So, as I say, I am thinking
mostly about the chances of getting the opportunities. I don't
know, of course, just how close you can place your arrows at thirty
yards, and it is getting the first hole into them that I am most
interested in now. I feel that we ought to get some good chances,
as I have seen so many bear in the park; but, of course, have never
hunted them and don't know just how keen they will be when it comes
right down to getting their hides. There are some scattered all
over the park that will rob a camp at night, and some of them will
even put up a fight for it, but most of them will beat it as soon
as one gets after them.

"It would be impossible, I believe, to keep dogs still while
watching a bait, as they would get the scent of any approaching
bear, and then you would not be able to keep them quiet, and they
would most likely scare the bear out of the country. I can rustle a
few dogs to take along if you want them, and pretty good dogs, too;
but I am not strong for them myself only in this way, to put them
on the trail of a bear and take a good horse apiece, so that we
could get up to the chase and have a chance to land on him. This
might be a good thing to try if all others failed.

"I know how you feel about killing clean with the bow and not
having any shooting, and I can assure you that I would let 'em get
just as close as you want them, and not feel any concern about
their getting the best of anybody, and you would have a chance to
use the bow well in this case; but I am more prone to think they
will beat it off with a lot of your perfectly good arrows than
anything else.

"Yours truly,

"NED FROST."


It was apparent from the first that dogs were of little use in taking
grizzly. It would be necessary to shoot from blinds set conveniently
near bait. Frost assured us that bears of this variety, when just out
of hibernation and lean, would run out of the country if chased by a
pack of dogs, and incidentally kill all that they could catch. In the
fall of the year, when the bears are fat, they refuse to run, but wade
through the pack, which is unable to keep him from attacking the
hunter.

As an example of this, he related an instance where he started a
grizzly with eight or ten Russian bear hounds, and chased the beast
about thirty miles. As he followed on horseback, he found one after the
other of his dogs torn to pieces, disemboweled, and dismembered. At
last, he came upon the bear at bay in deep snow, against a high cliff.
Only two of his hounds were left, and one of these had a broken leg.
Mad with vengeance, Frost shot the grizzly. It charged him at forty
yards. In quick succession he fired five bullets in the oncoming bear,
seemingly with no effect. Up to his waist in the snow, he was unable to
avoid its rush. It came on and fell dead on his chest, with the
faithful hound hanging to it in a desperate effort to save his master.

This is one of the three or four maulings that Ned has received in his
hunting experiences, which, he says, "have added frost to my golden
locks." The dog became a cherished pet in the family for many years.

Frost killed his first bear when fourteen years of age, and has added
nearly five hundred to this number since that time.

It is characteristic of the grizzly that he will charge upon the
slightest provocation, and that nothing will turn him aside from his
purpose. Later we found this particularly true where the female with
cubs is concerned.

Instances of this are too well known to recount, but one coming under
our own experience was related to me by Tom Murphy, the bear hunter of
California.

In early days in Humboldt County, there lived an old settler named Pete
Bluford, who was a squaw man. He shot a female grizzly with cubs within
a quarter of a mile of what are now the town limits of Blocksburg. The
beast charged and struck him to the ground. At the same time she ripped
open the man's abdomen. Bluford dropped under a fallen tree, where the
bear repeatedly assaulted him, tearing at his body. By rolling back and
forth as the grizzly leaped over the log to reach him from the other
side, he escaped further injury. Worried by the hunter's dog, she
finally ceased her efforts and wandered off. The man was able to reach
home in spite of a large open wound in his abdomen, with protruding
intestines. This was roughly sewed together by his friend, Beany
Powell. He recovered from the experience and lived many years with the
Indians of that locality. As an example of Western humor, it is related
that Beany Powell, when sewing up the wound with twine and a sack
needle, found a large lump of fat protruding from the incision, of
which he was unable to dispose; so he cut it off, tried out the grease
in the frying-pan and used it to grease his boots.

Old Bluford became a character in the country. He was, in fact, what is
colloquially known as "an old poison oaker." This is an individual who
sinks so low in the scale of civilization that he lives out in the
backwoods or poison oak brush and becomes animal in type. His hair grew
to his shoulders, his beard was unkempt, his finger nails were as long
as claws and filthy with dirt. Rags of unknown antiquity partially
covered his limbs, vermin infested his body and he stayed with the most
degraded remnants of the Indians.

One cold winter they found him dead in his dilapidated cabin. He lay on
the dirt floor, his ragged coat over his face, his hands beneath his
head, and two house cats lay frozen, one beneath each arm. These old
pioneers were strange people and died strange deaths.

In our plans to capture grizzlies we took into consideration the
proclivity of this beast to attack. We knew his speed was tremendous.
He is able to catch a horse or a dog on the run. Therefore, it is
useless for a man to try to run away from him. There is no such thing
as being able to climb a tree if the animal is at close quarters. Adams
has shown that it is a mistake to attempt it. One only stretches
himself out inviting evisceration in the effort.

We decided if cornered either to dodge or to lie flat and feign death.
So we practiced dodging, our running being more for the purpose of
gaining endurance and to follow the bear if necessary.

Ishi, the Yana Indian, said that grizzlies were to be overcome with
arrows and if they charged, they were to be met with the spear and
fire. So we constructed spears having well-tempered blades more than a
foot in length set upon heavy iron tubing and riveted to strong ash
handles six feet in length. Back of the blade we fashioned quick
lighting torches of cotton waste saturated with turpentine. These could
be ignited by jerking a lanyard fastened to a spring faced with
sandpaper. The spring rested on the ends of several matches. It was an
ingenious and reliable device.

The Esquimaux used a long spear in hunting the polar bear. It was ten
or twelve feet in length. After being shot with an arrow, if the bear
charged, they rested the butt of the spear on the ground, lowered the
point and let the bear impale himself on it.

When the time came to use our weapons, Ned Frost dissuaded us from the
attempt. He said that he once owned a pet grizzly and kept it fast with
a long chain in the back yard. This bear was so quick that it could lie
in its kennel, apparently asleep, and if a chicken passed within proper
distance, with incredible quickness she reached out a paw and seized
the chicken without the slightest semblance of effort. And when at
play, the boys tried to stick the bear with a pitchfork, she would
parry the thrusts and protect herself like a boxer. It was impossible
to touch her.

The fire, Frost thought, might serve at night, but in the daylight it
would lose its effect. So he insisted that he would carry a gun to be
used in case of attack. On our part, we stipulated that he was to
resort to it only to prevent disaster and protested that such an
exigency must be looked upon by us as a complete failure of our plans.
We knew we could not stop the mad rush of a bear with our arrows, but
we hoped to kill at least one by this means and compromise on the rest
if necessary.

Indians, besides employing the spear, poisoned arrows, and fire, also
used protected positions, or shot from horseback. We scorned to shoot
from a tree and were told that few horses could be ridden close enough,
or fast enough, to get within bowshot of a grizzly.

Inquiry among those qualified to know, led to the estimate of the
number of all bears in the Park to be between five hundred and one
thousand. Considering that there are some three thousand square miles
of land, that there were nearly sixty thousand elk, besides hundreds of
bison, antelope, mountain sheep, and similar animals, this does not
seem improbable. I am aware that recent statements are to the effect
that there were only forty grizzlies there. This is palpably an
underestimate, and probably takes into account only those that frequent
the dumps. Frost believes that there are several hundred grizzlies in
the Park, many of which range out in the adjacent country. So we felt
no fear of decimating their ranks, and had every hope of seeing many.
In fact, their number has so increased in recent years that they have
become a menace and require killing off.

During the past five years four persons have either been mauled or
killed by grizzlies in Yellowstone. One of these was a teamster by the
name of Jack Walsh. He was sleeping under his wagon at Cold Springs
when a large bear seized him by the arm, dragged him forth and ripped
open his abdomen. Walsh died of blood poison and peritonitis a few days
later. Frost himself was attacked. He was conducting a party of
tourists through the preserve and had just been explaining to them
around the camp-fire that there was no danger of bears. He slept in the
tent with a horse wrangler by the name of Phonograph Jones. In the
middle of the night a huge grizzly entered his tent and stepped on the
head of Jones, peeling the skin off his face by the rough pressure of
his paw. The man waked with a yell, whereupon the bear clawed out his
lower ribs. The cry roused Frost, who having no firearms, hurled his
pillow at the bear.

With a roar, the grizzly leaped upon Ned, who dived into his sleeping
bag. The animal grasped him by the thighs, and dragged him from the
tent out into the forest, sleeping bag and all. As he carried off his
victim, he shook him from side to side as a dog shakes a rat. Frost
felt the great teeth settle down on his thigh bones and expected
momentarily to have them crushed in the powerful jaws. In a thicket of
jack pines over a hundred yards from camp, the bear shook him so
violently that the muscles of the man's thighs tore out and he was
hurled free from the bag. He landed half-naked in the undergrowth
several yards away.

While the frenzied bear still worried the bedding, Frost dragged
himself to a near-by pine and pulled himself up in its branches by the
strength of his arms.

The camp was in an uproar; a huge fire was kindled; tin pans were
beaten; one of the helpers mounted a horse and by circling around the
bear, succeeded in driving him away.

After first aid measures were administered, Frost was successfully
nursed back to health and usefulness by his wife. But since that time
he has an inveterate hatred of grizzlies, hunting them with grim
persistency.

It is said that nearly forty obnoxious grizzlies were shot by the Park
rangers after this episode and Frost was given a permit to carry a
weapon. We found later that he always went to sleep with a Colt
automatic pistol strapped to his wrist.

We planned to enter the Park in two parties. One, comprised of Frost,
the cook, horse wrangler, my brother, and his friend, Judge Henry
Hulbert, of Detroit, was to proceed from Cody and come with a pack
train across Sylvan Pass. Our party consisted of Arthur Young and
myself; Mr. Compton was unexpectedly prevented from joining us by
sickness in his family. We were to journey by rail to Ashton. This was
the nearest point to Yellowstone Station on the boundary of the
reservation that could be reached by railroad in winter.

We arrived at this point near the last of May 1920. The roads beyond
were blocked with snow, but by good fortune, we were taken in by one of
the first work trains entering the region through the personal interest
and courtesy of the superintendent of the Pocatello division.

We had shipped ahead of us a quantity of provisions and came outfitted
only with sleeping bags, extra clothing, and our archery equipment.
This latter consisted of two bows apiece and a carrying case containing
one hundred and forty-four broad-heads, the finest assembly of bows and
arrows since the battle of Crecy.

Young had one newly made bow weighing eighty-five pounds and his
well-tried companion of many hunts, Old Grizzly, weighing seventy-five
pounds.

He later found the heavier weapon too strong for him in the cold
weather of the mountains, where a man's muscles stiffen and lose their
power, while his bow grows stronger.

My own bows were seventy-five pounds apiece--"Old Horrible," my
favorite, a hard hitter and sweet to shoot, and "Bear Slayer," the
fine-grained, crooked-limbed stave with which I helped to kill our
first bear. Our arrows were the usual three-eighths birch shafts,
carefully selected, straight and true. Their heads were tempered steel,
as sharp as daggers. We had, of course, a few blunts and eagle arrows
in the lot.

In the Park we found snow deep on the ground and the roads but recently
cleared with snow plows and caterpillar tractors. We traveled by auto
to Mammoth Hot Springs and paid our respects to Superintendent
Albright, and ultimately settled in a vacant ranger's cabin near the
Canyon. Here we awaited the coming of the second party.

Our entrance into the Park was well known to the rangers, who were
instructed to give us all the assistance possible. This cabin soon
became a rendezvous for them and our evenings were spent very
pleasantly with stories and fireside music.

After several days, word was sent by telephone that Frost and his
caravan were unable to cross Sylvan Pass because of fifty feet of snow
in the defile, and that he had returned to Cody where he would take an
auto truck and come around to the northern entrance to the Park,
through Gardner, Montana.

At the expiration of three days he drove up to our cabin in a flurry of
snow. This was about the last day in May.

Frost himself is one of the finest of Western types; born and raised in
the sage brush country, a hunter of big game ever since he was large
enough to hold a gun. He was in the prime of life, a man of infinite
resource, courage, and fortitude. We admired him immensely.

With him he had a full camp outfit, selected after years of experience,
and suited to any kind of weather.

The party consisted of Art Cunningham, the cook; G.D. Pope, and Judge
Henry Hulbert. Art came equipped with a vast amount of camp craft and
cookery wisdom. My brother came to see the fun, the Judge to take
pictures and add dignity to the occasion. All were seasoned woodsmen
and hunters.

We moved to more commodious quarters, a log cabin in the vicinity, made
ourselves comfortable, and let the wind-driven snow pile deep drifts
about our warm shelter while we planned a campaign against the
grizzlies.

So far, we had met few bears, and these were of the tourist variety.
They had stolen bacon from the elevated meat safe, and one we found in
the woods sitting on his haunches calmly eating the contents of a box
of soda crackers. These were the hotel pets and were nothing more than
of passing interest to us.

Contrary to the usual condition, no grizzlies were to be seen. The only
animals in evidence were a few half-starved elk that had wintered in
the Park, marmots, and the Canadian jay birds.

We began our hunts on foot, exploring Hayden Valley, the Sour Creek
region, Mt. Washburn, and the headwaters of Cascade Creek.

The ground was very wet in places and heavy with snow in the woods. It
was necessary, therefore, to wear rubber pacs, a type of shoe well
suited to this sort of travel.

Our party divided into two groups, usually my brother and the Judge
exploring in one direction while Young and I kept close at the heels of
Frost. We climbed all the high ridges and swept the country with our
binocular glasses. Prom eight to fourteen hours a day we walked and
combed the country for bear signs.

Our original plan was to bring in several decrepit old horses with the
pack train and sacrifice them for bait. But because of the failure of
this part of our program, we were forced to find dead elk for this
purpose. We came across a number of old carcasses, but no signs that
bear had visited them recently. Our first encounter with grizzly came
on the fourth day. We were scouting over the country near Sulphur
Mountain, when Frost saw a grizzly a mile off, feeding in a little
valley. The snow had melted here and he was calmly digging roots in the
soft ground. We signalled to our party and all drew together as we
advanced on our first bear, keeping out of sight as we did so.

We planned to go rapidly down a little cut in the hills and intercept
him as he came around the turn. Progressing at a rapid pace, Indian
file, we five hunters went down the draw, when suddenly our bear, who
had taken an unexpected cut-off, came walking up the ravine. At a sign
from Ned, we dropped to our knees and awaited developments. The bear
had not seen us and the faint breeze blew from him to us. He was about
two hundred yards off. We were all in a direct line, Frost ahead, I
next, Young behind me, and the others in the rear. Our bows were braced
and arrows nocked.

Slowly the bear came feeding toward us. He dug the roots of white
violets, he sniffed, he meandered back and forth, wholly unconscious of
our presence. We hardly breathed. He was not a good specimen, rather a
scrawny, long-nosed, male adolescent, but a real grizzly and would do
as a starter.

At last he came within fifty yards, stopped, pawed a patch of snow, and
still we did not shoot. We could not without changing our position
because we were all in one line. So we waited for his next move, hoping
that he would advance laterally and possibly give us a broadside
exposure.

But he came onward, directly for us, and at thirty yards stopped to
root in the ground again. I thought, "Now we must shoot or he will walk
over us!" Just then he lifted his head and seemed to take an eyeful of
Young's blue shirt. For one second he half reared and stared. I drew my
bow and as the arrow left the string, he bounded up the hill. The
flying shaft just grazed his shoulder, parting the fur in its course.
Quick as a bouncing rubber ball, he leaped over the ground and as
Young's belated arrow whizzed past him, he disappeared over the hill
crest.

We rose with a deep breath and shouted with laughter. Ned said that if
it had not been for that blue shirt, the bear would have bumped into
us. Well, we were glad we missed him, because after all, he was not the
one we were looking for. It is a hard thing to pick grizzlies to order.
You can't go up and inspect them ahead of time.

This fiasco was just an encouragement to us, and we continued to rise
by candle light and hunt till dark. The weather turned warmer, and the
snow began to melt.

At the end of the first week we saw five grizzlies way off in the
distance at the head of Hayden Valley. They were three or four miles
from us and evening was approaching, so we postponed an attack on them.
Next morning, bright and early, we were on the ground again, hoping to
see them. Sure enough, there they were! Ned, Art and I were together;
my brother and the Judge were off scouting on the other side of the
ridge. It was about half past eight in the morning. The bears, four in
number this time, were feeding in the grassy marshland, about three
miles up the valley. Ned's motto has always been: "When you see 'em, go
and get 'em."

We decided to attack immediately. Down the river bank, through the
draws, up into the timber we circled at a trot. It was hard going, but
we were pressed for time. At last we came out on a wooded point a
quarter of a mile above the bears, and rested. We knew they were about
to finish their morning feeding and go up into the forest to lay up for
the day. So we watched them in seclusion.

We waxed our bowstrings and put the finishing touches on our
arrow-heads with a file.

Slowly the bears mounted the foothills, heading for a large patch of
snow, where Frost thought they would lie down to cool before entering
the woods. It seems that their winter coat makes them very susceptible
to heat, and though the sun had come out pleasantly for us, it was too
hot for them. There was an old female and three half-grown cubs in
their third year, all looking big enough for any museum group.

At last they settled down and began to nuzzle the snow. The time had
come for action. We proposed to slip down the little ravine at the edge
of the timber, cross the stream, ascend the hill on the opposite side,
and come up on our quarry over the crest. We should thus be within
shooting distance. The wind was right for this maneuver, so we started
at once.

Now as I write my muscles quiver, my heart thumps and I flush with a
strange feeling, thinking of that moment. Like a soldier before a
battle, we waded into an uncharted experience. What does a man think of
as he is about to enter his first grizzly encounter? I remember well
what passed through my head: "Can we get there without alarming the
brutes?" "How close will they be?" "Can we hit them?" "What will happen
then?"

Ned Frost, Young and I were to sneak up on four healthy grizzlies in
the open, and pit our nerve against their savage reaction. Ned had his
rifle, but this was to be used only as a last resort, and that might
easily fail at such short range.

As we walked rapidly, stepping with utmost caution, I answered all the
questions of my subconscious fears. "Hit them? Why, we will soak them
in the gizzard; wreck them!" "Charge? Let them come on and may the best
man win!" "Die? There never was a fairer, brighter, better day to die
on." In fact, "Lead on!" I felt absolutely gay. A little profanity or a
little intellectual detachment at these times is of material help in
the process of auto-suggestion.

As for Young, he was silent, and possibly was thinking of camp
flapjacks.

Half way up the hill, on the opposite side of which lay our grizzlies,
we stopped, braced our bows, took three arrows apiece from our quivers,
and proceeded in a more stealthy approach.

Young and I arranged ourselves on each side of Frost, abreast with him.
Near the top Ned took out a green silk handkerchief and floated it in
the gentle breeze to see if the wind had changed. If it had, we might
find the bears coming over the top to meet us. Everything was perfect,
so far! Now, stooping low we crept to the very ridge itself, to a spot
directly above which we believed the bears to be. Laying our hats on
the grass and sticking our extra arrows in the ground before us, we
rose up, bows half drawn, ready to shoot.

There on the snow, not over twenty-five yards off, lay four grizzly
bears, just like so many hearth rugs.

Instantly, I selected the farthest bear for my mark and at a signal of
the eye we drew our great bows to their uttermost and loosed two deadly
arrows.

We struck! There was a roar, they rose, but instead of charging us,
they rushed together and began such a fight as few men have seen. My
bear, pinioned with an arrow in the shoulder, threw himself on his
mother, biting her with savage fury. She in turn bit him in the bloody
shoulder and snapped my arrow off short. Then all the cubs attacked
her. The growls and bellowing were terrific.

Quickly I nocked another arrow. The beasts were milling around
together, pawing, biting, mad with rage. I shot at my bear and missed
him. I nocked again. The old she-bear reared on her haunches, stood
high above the circling bunch, cuffing and roaring, the blood running
from her mouth and nostrils in frothy streams. Young's arrow was deep
in her chest. I drove a feathered shaft below her foreleg.

The confusion and bellowing increased, and, as I drew a fourth arrow
from my quiver, I glanced up just in time to see the old female's hair
rise on the back of her neck. She steadied herself in her wild hurtling
and looked directly at us with red glaring eyes. She saw us for the
first time! Instinctively I knew she would charge, and she did.

Quick as thought, she bounded toward us. Two great leaps and she was on
us. A gun went off at my ear. The bear was literally knocked head over
heels, and fell in backward somersaults down the steep snowbank. At
some fifty yards she checked her course, gathered herself, and
attempted to charge again, but her right foreleg failed her. She rose
on her haunches in an effort to advance, when, like a flash, two arrows
flew at her and disappeared through her heaving sides. She faltered,
wilted, and as we drew to shoot again, she sprawled out on the ground,
a convulsed, quivering mass of fur and muscle--she was dead.

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