At that instant, a resounding whack landed on the rubber snout and the second bear must have felt a twinge all through his body.
Though each blow caused the recipient to recoil, yet he instantly returned, so that Carson was kept busy pounding the noses as if he was an old fashioned farmer threshing wheat with a flail.
It was a question with Carson which would last the longer--the club or the snouts, but in the hope of getting beyond their reach, he climbed to the topmost bough, where he crouched into the smallest possible space.
It was idle, however, to hope they would overlook him, for they pushed on up the tree which swayed with their weight.
The nose of the grizzly bear is one of the most sensitive portions of his body, and the vigorous thumps which the hunter brought down upon them, brought tears of pain to their eyes.

But while they suffered, they were roused to fury by the repeated rebuffs, and seemed all the more set on crunching the flesh and bones of the insignificant creature who defied them.
It must have been exasperating beyond imagination to the gigantic beasts, who feared neither man nor animal to find themselves repeatedly baffled by a miserable being whom they could rend to pieces with one blow of their paws, provided they could approach nigh enough to reach him.
They came up again and again; they would draw back so as to avoid those stinging strokes, sniff, growl and push upward, more eager than ever to clutch the poor fellow, who was compressing himself between the limb and the trunk, and raining his blows with the persistency of a pugilist.
They were finally forced to desist for a few minutes in order to give their snouts time to regain their tone.

The bulky creatures looked at each other and seemed to say, "That's a mighty queer customer up there; he doesn't fight fairly, but we'll fetch him yet." Once more and for the last time, they returned to the charge, but the plucky scout was awaiting them, and his club whizzed through the air like the piston rod of a steam engine.

The grizzlies found it more than they could stand, and tumbling back to solid earth they gave up the contract in disgust.

Carson tarried where he was until they were beyond sight, when he descended and hastily caught up and reloaded his rifle, having escaped, as he always declared, by the narrowest chance of all his life..