I remember a solitary old bull that lived on
the mountain-side opposite my camp one summer, a most interesting
mixture of fear and boldness, of reserve and intense curiosity. After
I had hunted him a few times, and he found that my purpose was wholly
peaceable, he took to hunting me in the same way, just to find out who
I was, and what queer thing I was doing. Sometimes I would see him at
sunset on a dizzy cliff across the lake, watching for the curl of
smoke or the coming of a canoe. And when I dove in for a swim and went
splashing, dog-paddle way, about the island where my tent was, he
would walk about in the greatest excitement, and start a dozen times
to come down; but always he ran back for another look, as if
fascinated. Again he would come down on a burned point near the deep
hole where I was fishing, and, hiding his body in the underbrush,
would push his horns up into the bare branches of a withered shrub,
so as to make them inconspicuous, and stand watching me. As long as he
was quiet, it was impossible to see him there; but I could always make
him start nervously by flashing a looking-glass, or flopping a fish in
the water, or whistling a jolly Irish jig.
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