deadly hug of the angry animal seemed unavoidable, when a shot from
Uncle John, which sent a bullet through the left eye into the very
brain, stretched the bear lifeless on the snow.

"If it hadn't been for you I should have had a squeeze, uncle!" cried
Tom, laughing.

"You're a thoughtless, foolish boy, Tom!" said his uncle; "who but you,
I wonder, would have run after a bear with nothing but a rail!"

"He is indeed a thoughtless boy," said his father, "but I hope a
grateful one; you have most probably saved his life!"

"Uncle knows I am grateful, I'm sure," said Tom, "I needn't tell him!"

"It's a fine beast, and fat as butter," remarked Uncle John, feeling its
sides as he spoke, "yet he must have been hungry, fond as a bear is of
pork, to venture so near a house by daylight!"

"What a warm fur!" observed Mr. Lee, "just feel how thick the hair is!"

"But what can we do with such a mountain of flesh and fat?" asked Tom.
"We can't eat it, and we've no dogs."

"O, we'll eat it fast enough!" replied his uncle; "a bear ham is a
delicacy, I assure you."

"I think we may as well set about skinning and cutting it up for curing
at once, as we have little to do to-day. What say you, John?"