AN ADVENTURE WITH A BEAR.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume X, Issue 1115, 5 August 1882, Page 4

AN ADVENTURE WITH A BEAR.

A. correspondent sends the following under date April 18, to the Poona Observer:—“A bear which for the past six or eight months has been the dread of the Bhil inhabitants on the skirts of the Deomogra Forest Reserve, in the north-western portion of Khandesh, was bagged on Monday last with her two cubs by Mr Christopher George, of the Topographical Survey. The brute was a perfect monster, and has lately become so fierce that two two cart tracks in the vicinity of her lair were disused, and the Bhils would on no account enter the country anywhere within a radius of two or three miles from her den. During the last twelve months she has killed four Bhils and mauled eight others. Mr George, who happened to be surveying this particular bit of ground, determined to make an attempt to rid the country of this brute, and while as work on Monday last came upon the animal’s usua l retreat. Having got at near as within ten or fifteen yards of the spot, Mr George and his Bhil followers waited patiently for a few moments, and the bear not putting in an appearance immediately, Mr George was guilty of the indiscretion of handing over his rifle to his man to light his cigar, but before he had time to strike a match the animal issued forth from her hiding place, and, fortunately for Mr George, she had no idea she was being so closely watched. Moreover, her attention was on the opposite side to that on which Mr George was standing. This advantage was not lost, for Mr George quietly regained his rifle, levelled, and m another moment the animal lay lifeless. The shot proved so effective that she died immediately. Her two cubs, who had all while been playing noisily on her back, seeing their mother killed, became frantic, but as they were too big and wild to be captured it was determined they should also be shot. Another cartridge brought down one of the cubs, and other, after much trouble and a chase, gave up after reccing two bullets.