fate is sealed. Sooner or later, the noose tightens over one leg, or
perchance over the neck and fore-paw, and as the rope straightens with a
"plunk," the horse braces itself desperately and the bear tumbles over.
Whether he regains his feet or not the cowboy keeps the rope taut; soon
another noose tightens over a leg, and the bear is speedily rendered
helpless.

I have known of these feats being performed several times in northern
Wyoming, although never in the immediate neighborhood of my ranch. Mr.
Archibald Roger's cowhands have in this manner caught several bears, on
or near his ranch on the Gray Bull, which flows into the Bighorn; and
those of Mr. G. B. Grinnell have also occasionally done so. Any set
of moderately good ropers and riders, who are accustomed to back one
another up and act together, can accomplish the feat if they have smooth
ground and plenty of room. It is, however, indeed a feat of skill and
daring for a single man; and yet I have known of more than one instance
in which it has been accomplished by some reckless knight of the rope
and the saddle. One such occurred in 1887 on the Flathead Reservation,
the hero being a half-breed; and another in 1890 at the mouth of
the Bighorn, where a cowboy roped, bound, and killed a large bear
single-handed.

My friend General "Red" Jackson, of Bellemeade, in the pleasant
mid-county of Tennessee, once did a feat which casts into the shade
even the feats of the men of the lariat. General Jackson, who afterwards
became one of the ablest and most renowned of the Confederate cavalry
leaders, was at the time a young officer in the Mounted Rifle Regiment,
now known as the 3rd United States Cavalry. It was some years before
the Civil War, and the regiment was on duty in the Southwest, then the
debatable land of Comanche and Apache. While on a scout after hostile