.OTc1.NjIyNjA

6 down it came to the ground. Instantly the bear had it in his grasp, and detecting the cheat, hastened to the foot of the tree, took Ish-pau-bi-kau’s trail and was away in pursuit of the fugitive, who was scarcely half a mile in advance. Ish-pau-bi-kau’s course brought him to the shore of a small lake in the centre of the tamarack swamp; he reached the shore as a point where he had once found and taken a bee tree, and a piece of the large hollow branch, about twelve feet long was still lying where he had left it; Into this he had just time to crawl, when his pursuer reached the spot. The aperture through the centre of the log, though large enough to admit a man, would not so much as let in the head of a white bear; So Brain after rolling the log over several times, exerting his prodigious strength, grasped it round the centre and waded with it into the lake; running one end of the log as far beneath the surface as he was able to force it, he looked up at the other end, and there was the head and shoulders of Ish-pau-bi-kau exposed to sight. Instantly reversing the log, he immersed the other end, and looking up again, he obtained a sight of the feet and legs of Ish-pau-bi-kau, who though unable to turn around, had climbed up feet foremost until he got from under the water and reached the air. After repeating this manoeuvre until he was satisfied he could effect nothing, the bear laid the log down on the water, and getting on top of it, his immense weight sunk it far beneath the surface. After keeping it in this position long enough to drown a pearl diver, had one been in Ish-pau-bi-kau’s place, the bear took a look into one end of the log, and to his astonishment found it empty; whilst far out in the centre of the lake, he soon after discovered Ish-pau-bi-kau apparently as much in his element as a young duck; at swimming both on, and beneath the surface of the water, Ish-pau-bi-kau had not his equal in the tribe. The bear now abandoned the log and swam off in pursuit. Ish-pau-bi-kau would permit him to approach almost near enough to reach him, and then diving would invariably re-appear in precisely the opposite direction from that in which the bear would be waiting for him. The bear at length growing tired of the fruitless chase, goes