The Bennington banner. [volume] (Bennington, Vt.) 1858-1894, 1893-11-10
ALUcKY SHOT.
1T SAVED A ROCKY MOUNTAIN HUN
TIERS LIFE FIVE TIMES.

A group Of men were sitting on the
hotel porch swapping" yarns. ''Some
people do not believe in luck; well, 1 do,
and I'll tell you why" said the traveller
as he paused and deliberately put his
right leg across the knee of his left and
glanced pcnsively down the street. The
group pricked up their ears, for the
traveller was famous story teller, and
all rightly judged that his remark was
but the prelude to the recital of one of
his adventures.
when l was some Is years younger
than ain now," continued the traveller,
II was exceedingly fond of hunting.
One fall my love of this sport led me to
take hunting trip in the Rocky noun
tains. l was ambitious and wanted to
add q grizzly bear skin and a few elk
heads to my collection of trophies, and
incidentally, if it might be, to let day
light through an Indian or two.
"Well, for two weeks hunted with
out getting sight of hair or track of elk,
bear or Indian, and the thing was be-
ginning to get monotonous, when one
afternoon found me traversing the bot
tom of deep canyon. was alone, my
guide having remained in camp on &C
count of a sprained ankle. The bed OF
the canyon was rent with deep assures
and covered with great rocks, and its
sides were scanned and cracked. A few
stunted shrubs and trees, of the kind the
elk is fond of feeding upon, grew along
the sides and bottom of the canyon, and
hoped to find some of the animals here
cropping the tender twigs. At last, just
as 1 rounded high point of rocks, l
caught sight of an elk, noble fellow,
standing some 10 rods up the canyon
with his face toward me. He was nos
ing the air suspiciously, and l feared
that would not get shot at him unless
l was quick about it. Accordingly l
threw my rifle to my shoulder, and TAX
ing hasty aim at the broad, fat forehead
fired.
81 was totally unprepared for the
startling effect of that shot. Almost at
the instant my finger pressed the trigger
there came puff of white smoke from
behind rock some 20 rods up on the
opposite side of the canyon, and saw an
Indian leap to his feet only to fall back
dead, while at the same moment pierre
ing scream, seemingly coming from d.
rectly over my head, caused me to look
quickly up. In the midair, with great
paws outstretched and long, sharp nails
extended, beheld a mountain lion ap-
parently about to drop on my head.
bounded to one side. AS l did so my
blood almost froze with horror, for
had jumped directly over rattlesnake,
which now lay not two feet from me,
with his head reared ready to strike.
Before could make movement to
defend myself from this new danger
down upon the snake fell the body of the
lion, crushing out its life. The lion
rolled over once or twice and then, to
my surprise, lay still. Il had not had
time to recover from the terror and as
constituent caused by these startling in
cidents when my ears were greeted with
terrific believing, and looking up the
canyon l saw the elk charging down
upon me. / whirled about, intending to
seek safety in fight, when, to my utter
confusion, not dozen feet away and di-
rectly in the path l must pursue if l con-
tinued my flight a monster grizzly bear
reared himself up on his hind legs and
with wide open mouth rushed for me.
was in an awful situation. could see
no possible way of escaping On the
right hand was the perpendicular wall
of the canyon and on the left deep
chasm. Before was the grizzly bear and
behind the rushing elk. Death faced me
whatever way l turned. l trust l may
never feel the horror of that moment
again. The grizzly bear sprang forward
to seize and crush out my life with his
strong arms, and the elk gave mighty
bound, his huge horns lowered ready to
transfx my body.
cat that moment my heart seemed to
sink into my boots, and fell fiat upon
the ground. With crash like that of
the collision of two locomotives, the ami
mails met over my PROSTATE form. The
terrific momentum Of the elk bore him
| Sell anu bIO DCdA ONCl AIJ DOuJs EOA
about five seconds there was tremen-
dous struggle; then both beasts fell,
locked together, to the ground, and in a
moment more had expired. One of the
sharp prongs of the horns of the elk had
pierced the heart Of the grizzly, and the
elk's neck had been broken by the bear
in his death struggle. / bounded to my
feet, not knowing whether to run or
stand still, SO sudden, so terrible and so
many had been the dangers which had
threatened me. But everything was
quiet, and all my foes were dead.
"On investigation / found that my
rifle ball had struck the elk at the base
of the horns, where the bone is thick
and hard, and after partially stunning
nim had glanced diagonally across the
canyon and pierced the brain of the In
lian, who, concealed behind rock, was
about to fire upon me. THE shock of the
ball had been sufficient to defect the
aim of the Indian enough to cause him
TO miss me and to pierce the heart of the
mountain lion just at the moment he
sprang uponm from cleft in the rocks
above my head. The lion landed upon
the rattlesnake and crushed the life out
of him before he had had time to strike,
and the elk and the bear in their eager
ness to kill me had DESTROYED each other