178 TRUE BEAR STORIES.

along the stream. One of the most success-
ful miners was Mike Brannan, whose cab-
ins and mining appliances lie unused and
decaying about six miles from the place
where the expedition camped.

From the camp on the Mutaw the expe-
dition followed Piru Creek down to Lock-
wood, and the latter up to the divide be-
tween Lockwood Valley and the Cuddy
ranch at the foot of Mount Pinos, called
Sawmill Mountain by the settlers. The
mountain is about 10,000 feet high, and is
covered with heavy pine timber. Ever
since Haggin & Carr’s sheep have been on
the mountain, the bears from forty miles
around have made annual marauding ex-
peditions, and kept the herders on the
jump all the summer. The first band of
sheep and the Examiner expedition arrived
at the old Sawmill simultaneously this
year, and the Basque who was herding the
band, having a very lively sense of the dan-
ger of his situation, pitched his tent close
to the camp, where he would be under the