There are exceptions to this rule of the rifle however. In the
years after the Civil War one of the many noted hunters of southwest
Virginia and east Tennessee was Wilber Waters, sometimes called The
Hunter of White Top. He often killed black bear with a knife and dogs.
He spent all his life in hunting and was very successful, killing
the last gang of wolves to be found in his neighborhood; and he slew
innumerable bears, with no worse results to himself than an occasional
bite or scratch.
In the southern States the planters living in the wilder regions have
always been in the habit of following the black bear with horse and
hound, many of them keeping regular packs of bear hounds. Such a pack
includes not only pure-bred hounds, but also cross-bred animals, and
some sharp, agile, hard-biting fierce dogs and terriers. They follow the
bear and bring him to bay but do not try to kill him, although there are
dogs of the big fighting breeds which can readily master a black bear
if loosed at him three or four at a time; but the dogs of these southern
bear-hound packs are not fitted for such work, and if they try to close
with the bear he is certain to play havoc with them, disemboweling them
with blows of his paws or seizing them in his arms and biting through
their spines or legs.
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