Bears
In the days of Linnaeus – that is, a century and a half ago – it was supposed there was only one kind of Bear in existence – the common Brown bear of Europe. It is true that Linnaeus before his death had heard of the great Polar bear, but he had never seen one, and was not certain of its being a distinct species. Not only has the Polar bear proved to be a very different animal from his brown congener, but other species have turned up in remote quarters of the globe: until the list of these interesting quadrupeds has been extended to the number of at least a dozen distinct species – differing not only in size, shape, and colour, but also in many more essential characteristics. Bears have been found in North America, and others in South America; some in Asia, and still others in the islands of the Indian Archipelago; entirely unlike the brown bear of Europe, as they are to one another.
As the Brown bear is the oldest of the family known to naturalists, I shall give him the precedence in this little monograph.
It is a misnomer to call him the brown bear of Europe, since he is even more common in many parts of Asia – especially throughout Asiatic Russia and Kamtschatka. But he is also met with in most European countries, where there are extensive ranges of mountains. In the mountains of Hungary and Transylvania – as well as in those of Russia, Sweden, and Norway – the brown bear is found. He is also met with as far south as the Alps – and even the Pyrenees, and Asturias, mountains of Spain; but the bear of these last-mentioned localities differs considerably from the real brown bear of the northern regions; and most probably is a different species.
Again, in North America – in a very remote and sterile region lying to the westward of Hudson’s Bay, and known as the Barren Grounds – a large brown bear has been observed by travellers and traders of the Fur Company, supposed to be identical with the European bear. This, however, is a doubtful point; and in all likelihood the bear of the Barren Grounds is a new species, only found in that desolate region.
The brown bear is of solitary habits. During the summer season he roams about, growing fat upon roots, fruits, seeds, and wild honey – when he can procure it. At the approach of winter this animal has the singular habit of returning to his den, and there remaining dormant or torpid throughout the season of cold. During this prolonged slumber he takes no sustenance of any kind; and although exceedingly fat when going to rest, he comes forth in the spring-time as thin as a skeleton. The den is usually a cave or hollow tree; or, failing this, a lair, which the animal constructs for himself out of branches, lining it snugly with leaves and moss.
The brown bear is a long-lived animal. Individuals have been known of the age of fifty years. The cubs when first born are not much larger than the puppies of a mastiff. The people of Kamtschatka hunt this species with great assiduity, and obtain from it many of the comforts and necessaries of life. The skins are used for their beds and coverlets, for their caps, gloves, and boots. They manufacture from it harness for their dogs. From the intestines they make masks for their faces, to protect them from the glare of the sun; and they also use the latter stretched over their windows as a substitute for glass. The flesh and fat are among the most esteemed dainties of a Kamtschatkan cuisine. Even the shoulder-blades are used as sickles for cutting grass. The Laplanders, also – of whose cold country the brown bear is an inhabitant – have a great esteem for this animal. They regard its prowess as something wonderful, alleging that it has the strength of ten men, and the sense of twelve! The name for it, in their language, signifies the dog of God.
The White, or Polar bear, is, perhaps, the most interesting of the whole family: not so much on account of his superior size – since the brown and the grizzly are sometimes as large as he – but rather from his singular habits, and the many odd stories told about him, dining the last fifty years, by whalers and Arctic explorers.
To describe the appearance of the Polar bear would be superfluous. Everybody has seen either a living individual in a menagerie, or a stuffed skin of one in a museum; and the long, low, tail-less body – with outstretched neck and sharp projecting snout – covered with a thick coat of white hair, renders it impossible to mistake the Polar bear for any other animal.
This quadruped is more of a sea than land animal. Sometimes, it is true, he wanders inland for fifty miles or so; but this he does in following the course of some river or marshy inlet, where he finds fish. His usual haunts are along the icy shores of the Arctic Ocean, and the numerous ice-bound islands of the great Polar Sea. There he roams about over the frozen banks, or floats upon icebergs and drifts; or, if need be, takes to the open water, where he can swim with almost the facility of a fish.
A proof of his natatory powers is found in the fact that Arctic voyagers have observed him swimming about in the open sea full twenty miles from the nearest land! He is equally expert as a diver; and uses this art for the purpose of capturing various kinds of marine animals, upon which he subsists. In regard to food, the Polar bear differs altogether from his congeners. He is almost wholly carnivorous in his habits. Indeed, were it otherwise, he could not exist in his icy kingdom – in many parts of which not a trace of vegetation is to be found. Fish of many kinds, birds, and their eggs, and four-footed beasts – when he can lay his claws upon them – all are welcome to his palate. Nor will he disdain to feast upon the carcass of the great whale – when chance, or the whale fishermen, leaves such a provender in his way. The seal is a particular favourite with him, and he hunts this creature with skill and assiduity. When he perceives the seal basking upon a ledge of ice, he slips quietly into the water, and swims to leeward of his intended victim. He approaches by frequent short dives – so calculating his distance, that at the last he comes up close to the spot where the seal is lying. Should the victim attempt to escape, by rolling into the water, it falls into the bear’s clutches: if, on the contrary, it lies still, the bear makes a powerful spring, seizes it on the ice, and then kills and devours it at his leisure.
In swimming, the Polar bear not only moves rapidly through the water, but is also capable of darting forward in such a way as to seize a fish before it can escape beyond reach. On the land, also, he can move with rapidity – his slouching trot being almost as fast as the gallop of a horse.
Individuals have been shot that weighed as much as 1600 pounds!
Polar bears are found along the shores of the Arctic Ocean, both in Asia and America. They do not go to sleep in winter – that is, the males do not. The females with young, however, bury themselves in the snow – having formed a lair – and there remain until they bring forth their young. The cubs are often captured in these snow caves, which the Esquimaux discover by means of dogs trained for this peculiar purpose.
The Grizzly bear next merits attention. This formidable animal was, for a long time, supposed to be a variety either of the brown bear of Europe or the black bear of America; but his greater ferocity, so often and fatally experienced by travellers, drew the attention of naturalists upon him, when it was discovered that he was altogether distinct from either of the two. His name is usually coupled with that of the Rocky Mountains of America – for it is chiefly in the defiles and valleys of this stupendous chain that he makes his home. He wanders, however, far eastward over the prairies, and also to the Californian Mountains on the west; and in a latitudinal direction from the borders of Texas on the south, northward as far, it is supposed, as the shores of the Arctic Sea. At all events, a bear somewhat like him, if not identically the same, has been seen on the banks of the great Mackenzie River, near its mouth. Perhaps it may be the brown bear of the Barren Grounds, already noticed; and which last is, in many respects – in size and colour especially – very similar to the grizzly.
The grizzly bear is certainly the most ferocious of his tribe – even exceeding, in this unamiable quality, his white cousin of the icy north; and many a melancholy tale of trapper and Indian hunter attests his dangerous prowess. He is both carnivorous and frugivorous – will dig for roots and eat fruits when within his reach; but not being a tree-climber, he has to content himself with such berries as grow upon the humbler bushes. Indeed, it is a fortunate circumstance that the fierce animal is unable to ascend a tree. Many a traveller and hunter have found a neighbouring tree the readiest means of saving their lives, when pursued by this ferocious assailant. Another circumstance is also in favour of those pursued by the grizzly bear. In the