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BORIS THE BEAR-HUNTER
"_The huge brute was in full pursuit of his young wife._"Page 248. ]
BORIS THE BEAR-HUNTER
_T. NELSON & SONS_
BORIS THE BEAR-HUNTER BY FRED WHISHAW
LONDON, EDINBURGH, AND NEW YORK THOMAS NELSON AND SONS
_CONTENTS_
_I. The Hunter Hunted_ 9 _II. Boris Finds a New Friend_ 17 _III. Boris Changes Masters_ 25 _IV. Boris Goes A-sailing_ 34 _V. How Peter the Great was knocked over_ 46 _VI. A Taste of the Knout_ 56 _VII. A Race for Life_ 70 _VIII. Boris and his Fellow-Officers_ 84 _IX. One Sword against Five_ 96 _X. A Night Ambush_ 108 _XI. A Battle against Odds_ 120 _XII. A Perilous Slide_ 132 _XIII. Boris Goes on the War-path_ 144 _XIV. Taken Prisoner_ 155 _XV. An Exciting Escape_ 167 _XVI. Home Again_ 181 _XVII. Off to England_ 193 _XVIII. How Boris threw a Big Dutchman Overboard_ 204 _XIX. Bad News from Moscow_ 215 _XX. Boris in Disgrace_ 228 _XXI. Nancy and the Big Bear_ 243 _XXII. A Wolf Maiden_ 253 _XXIII. A Notable Day among the Wolves_ 266 _XXIV. With the Tsar Again_ 278 _XXV. Boris has a Narrow Escape_ 290 _XXVI. How Boris Outwitted the Swedish Admiral_ 303 _XXVII. Small Beginnings of a Great City_ 315 _XXVIII. How the Swedes Erected a Gibbet for Boris_ 326 _XXIX. Mazeppa_ 340 _XXX. Russia's Great Day_ 353 _XXXI. Peace at Last_ 366
_LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS_
"_The huge brute was in full pursuit of his young wife_" _Frontispiece._ "_That moment saved the Tsar's life_" 54 "_Slashing at the wolves which swarmed about him_" 81 "_In an instant the two were upon him_" 124 "_Out sprang Boris, and alighted with terrific force upon Menshikoff's back_" 186 "_Boris lifted his kicking legs and slid them over the bulwark_" 210 "_Bringing up his clenched fists together against the fellow's chin_" 337
BORIS THE BEAR-HUNTER.
CHAPTER I.THE HUNTER HUNTED.
The moment at which I propose to introduce my readers to Boris theBear-Hunter came very near, as it happened, to being the last which myhero was destined to spend upon this earth. Great hunter as Boris was,there is no doubt about it that on this particular occasion he met hismatch, and came within measurable distance of defeat at the hands--orrather paws--of one of the very creatures whose overthrow was at oncehis profession and his glory.
It happened many a year ago--about two hundred, in fact; and the sceneof Boris's adventure was an exceedingly remote one, far away in thenorth of Europe, close to Archangel.
Boris Ivanitch was a peasant whose home was an outlying village nearthe large town just mentioned. He was a serf, of course, as were allhis fellows at that time; but in consequence of his wonderful strengthand courage, and of his aptitude for pursuing and killing every kindof wild beast and game, he was exempt, by favour of his lord, bothfrom taxation and from the manual labour which the owner of the soilcould have exacted from him. In a word, Boris was employed to keep thecountry clear, or as clear as possible, of bears and wolves, which,when left to themselves, were at that time the cause of much danger andloss to the inhabitants of that portion of the Russian empire.
Boris performed his duties well. There was no man, young or old, forhundreds of miles around who could compare with this young giantin any of those sports or competitions in which the palm went tothe strongest. Tall and muscular beyond his years--for he was butnineteen at this time--lithe as a willow, straight as a poplar,Boris excelled in anything which called into play the qualities ofactivity and strength. Had he lived in our day and attended an Englishpublic school, he would undoubtedly have come to the front, whetheron the cricket or the football field, on the running path or on theriver. But being debarred from the privileges of English schoolboys,Boris was obliged to expend his energies in those exercises whichwere open to him, and which alone were familiar to the people of hiscountry--snow-shoeing, hunting, swimming, and similar sports natural tothe livers of a wild, outdoor life in a scarcely civilized land.
It was early summer-time, and the woods, or rather forests, aboutArchangel were in their fullest heyday of life and beauty. Hundreds ofsquare miles of pine trees were the principal feature of the landscape,dotted here and there by a patch of cultivated land, or watched over bya tumble-down village nestling beneath the shadow of the forest. Oatsand wheat, now fast ripening, waved in the soft air of June, and toldof peace and plenty for those who took the trouble to till the generoussoil for a living. The prospects of the crops around Dubinka, Boris'svillage, appeared at first sight to be promising enough--the rye wastall and nearly ripe, and the oats were doing capitally; but had youasked the peasants, the owners of the crops, they would have told you,with the lamentations common to the Russian peasant, that God hadcertainly been very good to them and sent them a fine harvest, but thatthe devil had spoiled all the good work by sending two large bears toeat up and trample down the fruits of the field, and to ruin the poorpeasants. Ivan's field was half eaten up already, they would have said,and Andrey's would go next. And Boris couldn't find the bears, or hewould soon give them "something in their stomachs better for them thanthe peasants' oats;" but there was no snow, and Boris could not trackthem without it, though he had been after the brutes for a fortnightand more.
This was all true enough--indeed, Boris was "after them" at the presentmoment, though to look at him you would scarcely have thought it; forthe hunter was busily engaged strolling lazily through the forest,picking and enjoying the beautiful wild strawberries which covered theground in profusion. He had propped his bear-spear against a tree, andwas at the moment some distance from the weapon--tempted away from itagainst his usual habit by the peculiar lusciousness of the fruit,which was warm from the sun, and very delicious.
Even strawberry eating palls at length upon the satiated palate, andBoris began to think that he had had enough. He would now resume, hethought, his search for those marauding bears who had broken into thevillage corn-fields and destroyed the peace of the poor peasants. Sohe picked one more handful of the strawberries, crammed them into hismouth, sighed, glanced regretfully at the delicious fruit at his feet,and finally raised his head to look for his bear-spear. As he did so,he became aware of a huge form standing close at hand, some ten yardsaway, showing its teeth, and quietly watching his movements. It was abear!
Boris's first feeling was one of great joy at meeting his enemy atlast; his second was one of dismay as he realized the want of histrusty spear.
It must not for a moment be supposed that Boris was alarmed by thesituation. If any one had told him that he was in a situation of peril,he would have laughed aloud at the very idea of such a thing. Hisregret was caused solel
y by the fear that, being unarmed, he might losethe opportunity of doing business with that bear upon this particularoccasion, and would probably have to find him again before settlingaccounts.
Hoping to catch sight of his spear, and to reach it before the bearcould make off, Boris backed slowly towards the place where he thoughthe had left the weapon. Bruin did not, as he had expected, give a loudroar to show his enemy that he was an awful fellow if he liked, andthen straightway turn and run. On the contrary, the brute advancedtowards the hunter, growling and showing certain very large andbusiness-like teeth. Then Boris felt that it would be well to find thatspear of his as quickly as possible, for he had no other weapon abouthim, and the bear appeared to be very much in earnest. So the hunterturned and ran, with the bear at his heels.
At first Boris rather enjoyed the chase. It would be an amusing storyto tell at the village when he arrived there with the bear's skin. Howthe peasants would all laugh, and how they would sing and make merryin the evening over the downfall of their enemy! Boris could afford totell a good story about himself and a bear, even though the laugh hadbeen on the bear's side to begin with, if he produced the skin of thebear at the same time.
Yes, _if_. But the growling of the brute sounded rather close at hisear, and Boris was forced to dodge in and out between the tree trunksin order to avoid capture.
As the moments passed, and he grew more and more out of breath, Borislonged eagerly for the welcome sight of his bear-spear. Once or twicethe bear had so nearly collared him that he bethought him that he mustdevise some plan by which to gain a little breath. A roar and a rushfrom behind at this moment, together with the loss of a considerableportion of the tail of his shirt, which, being worn outside thetrousers, Russian fashion, had fluttered in the breeze, made it plainthat there was no time to be lost. He must take to a tree and gaintime. So Boris pulled himself together, put on a mighty spurt, and wasfive feet up the stem of a pine tree just as Bruin reached the foot ofit, and rose on his hind legs to follow him aloft.
Up went Boris and up went Bruin, both fine climbers, and bothscrambling and puffing as though their very lives depended upon theiragility, as indeed was the case so far as concerned one at least ofthem. Quick as he was, Boris was nearly caught. He had barely time toclimb along a branch and let himself fall to the earth, when the bearwas already upon the same bough and looking down after him, meditatingas to whether he too should drop to the ground or adopt the slower andsafer course of climbing down again by the trunk, as he had come up.Luckily for Boris the discretion of that bear prevailed over his desireto save time, and he decided upon the slower method of descent. Thisdecision gave Boris a moment or two of breathing time, which he sadlyrequired.
He sat down to rest, and looked around frantically in every directionin hopes of catching sight of his spear. That action nearly cost himhis life. The bear, impatient as bears are when irritated, could nottolerate the slow process of descending which it had chosen, and whenhalf-way down the stem of the pine had dropped the rest of the way inorder to gain time. Boris was barely able to rise and slip away whenthe heavy brute dropped upon the very spot where he had been sitting.Away went Boris, slightly refreshed, and with his "second wind" comingon, and after him flew Bruin, furious and determined. Again Borisdodged and ran, and ran and dodged, and again he felt the hot breathand heard the loud pants and growls at his ear; again his breath beganto fail him, and his heart as well, when, just as he was nearly spent,his eye fell upon that which was to him at that moment the fairestsight that ever his eye beheld--his beloved spear leaning against atree-trunk one hundred yards away.
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