San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1888-07-07
A PANTHER'S CAVE.

Twenty years ago, before the disappear
ance of the buffalo, and before the power Of
the fighting tribes of Indians was broken, q
white man could get almost any sort Of adj
venture west of Omaha at q very early hour
in the morning. The Blue mountain country
Of Oregon, In which rise two Of the branches
of the Columbia river, was once hunters
paradise, and 1t was there the cinnamon and
the grizzly bears grew the largest and were
always aching for row with some ona The
first few white mon In there after pelts
CHANGED SO many perils that it was almost .
miracle II any Of them got out alive The
Indians were numerous and watchful, bears
and panthers as thick as mice In farm house,
and an adventure Of some sort was sure to
occur daily. -
had been In bit Of cove or valley on the
eastern side Of the mountains for ten or
twelve days before got anything like
scare 1t was within forty miles of the south
line Of Washington territory, and the country
for a hundred miles around me was In the
same savage state as when Columbus discov-
cred the continent The Indians were further
east, on the Snake river, or. further west. on
the Columbia and its branches, and only de-
tached parties were to be feared While this
was great burden off my mind, the bears
and panthers were so numerous that I was in
a state Of constant alarm through the day,
and dared not shut both eyes to sleep at
night had pack and a riding mule, and
on the first night of my arrival, while had
a bright fire burning, and the animals were
tethered within a stones throw, a panther
sprang upon old Bob, my riding mule, and
clawed him In a terrible way before could
get near enough to settle him with a bullet
Three or four bears prowled around my
camp all night, and the screams Of panther
kept my eyes wide open until daybreak.
However, after had thinned out the colony
by dozen or fifteen, the varmints began to
give me a rest ....
, On the tenth or eleventh day of my stay I
left camp at an early hour in the morning
loaded for bear. l followed the valley up
for half mile, and then turned into a
ravins which was the bed Of a creek during
the melting of the SHOWS It assembled very
gradually, and had been following it for
half an hour when it took q sharp bend to
the right. At this point there was hole in
the right hand cliff, and as | halted to look
at it wondered If it was not the home of
some savage beast had moved on about
500 feet when grizzly, which had been ly-
ing down among the broken rocks, suddenly
rose before me- l was looking for his kind,
but his appearance was SO sudden and he
showed fight 50 quickly that my heart was
beating altogether too fast as pulled up for
shot 1t bad to be q snap shot, for not
more than thirty feet separated Us Mine
was single barreled rife, and also had q
knife and revolver. The bullet struck bruin
in the left shoulder, and he spun around q
dozen times like q top. I was reloading
when he got ready to form Q closer acquaint-
anca BE bad, worked up the rayins and
had worked down, and we were now 100 feet
apart knew / could not finish loading
before he reached ms, and there was no other
way but to run for Il and hope that be was
too seriously wounded to oVertake me-
In those daYS ! could run like = horsA anA