At any rate he stiffened his forelegs, stopped short, and glared.
Up above, the breaths that had been held came in a shout together.
Everyone who saw the pause yelled to the bull to go on and prove his courage.

And the bull, when the first shock of surprise and distaste had passed, backed ominously, head lowered, tail switching in spasmodic jerks from side to side.

The bear stood a little straighter in her defiance; her head went forward an inch; beyond that she did not move, for her tactics were not to rush but to wait, and to put every ounce of her terrible strength into the meeting.
The neck of the bull swelled and curved, his eyeballs showed glassy.
His back humped; like a bowlder hurled down a mountain slope he made his rush, and nothing could swerve him.
The bear might have dodged, and sent him crashing against the wall.

Men hoped that she would, and so prolong the excitement.

But she did not.
She stood there and waited, her forepaws outspread as if for an embrace.
Like a bullet sent true to the target, the head of the bull met the gaunt, ungainly, gray shape; met and went down, the tip of one sharp horn showing in the rough hair of her back, her body collapsing limply across the neck she had broken with one tremendous side-blow as he struck.