A man was telling of his encounter with a bear. "It was a tremendous brute
and in a very ugly mood, too. I ran like blazes and so did he, and he was
gaining on me. Up ahead, though, there was a tree with a good stout branch
stuck out horizontally about twenty feet above the ground. If I could get
onto it, I might outwait the bear and be safe. I had no time to climb the
tree , I had to jump the twenty feet. The hot breath of the bear nerved me
on, so I jumped -- and missed the branch !"

"Good Lord!" said a listener. "What did you do then?"

"Oh, it was all right. I caught that branch on the way down."