he sent them crashing to earth with a drive of his giant paw. If they
were green, he put his own mark over the other mark, and made it clearer
by slashing the bark with the great pickaxes that grew on his toes.

The Upper Piney had so long been a Blackbear range that the Squirrels
had ceased storing their harvest in hollow trees, and were now using the
spaces under flat rocks, where the Blackbears could not get at them; so
Wahb found this a land of plenty: every fourth or fifth rock in the pine
woods was the roof of a Squirrel or Chipmunk granary, and when he turned
it over, if the little owner were there, Wahb did not scruple to flatten
him with his paw and devour him as an agreeable relish to his own
provisions. And wherever Wahb went he put up his sign-board:

Trespassers beware!

It was written on the trees as high up as he could reach, and every one
that came by understood that the scent of it and the hair in it were
those of the great Grizzly Wahb.

If his Mother had lived to train him, Wahb would have known that a good
range in spring may be a bad one in summer. Wahb found out by years of
experience that a total change with the seasons is best. In the early
spring the Cattle and Elk ranges, with their winter-killed carcasses,
offer a bountiful feast. In early summer the best forage is on the warm
hill-sides where the quamash and the Indian turnip grow. In late
summer the berry-bushes along the river-flat are laden with fruit, and
in autumn the pine woods gave good chances to fatten for the winter. So
he added to his range each year. He not only cleared out the Blackbears
from the Piney and the Meteetsee, but he went over the Divide and killed
that old fellow that had once chased him out of the Warhouse Valley.