Part 20

The female bear when pursued carries or pushes her cubs forwards, and the little creatures are described as placing themselves across her path to be shoved forwards. Scoresby mentions an instance where, when projected some yards in advance, the cubs ran on until she overtook them, when they alternately adjusted themselves for a second throw.

It is chiefly on the seal that this bear feeds, and it displays great cunning in catching them as they sleep on the ice, or come to the holes in the ice to breathe, when it destroys them with one blow of its formidable and heavy paw. For its mode of getting the walrus we refer the reader to "Excelsior," vol. i. p. 37. Notwithstanding his strength and ferocity, the Esquimaux frequently kill the polar bear, as they esteem its flesh and fat, and highly prize its skin. The flesh is not so prized by Saxons, whether they be European or American. Dr Kane's opinion would differ but little from that of Arctic voyagers on our side of the Atlantic. The surgeon to the "Grinnell Expedition" in search of Sir John Franklin thus characterises its flesh: "Bear is strong, very strong, and withal most capricious meat; you cannot tell where to find him. One day he is quite beefy and bearable; another, hircine, hippuric, and detestable."

It is but fair to say that Captain Parry regards the flesh of the polar bear to be as wholesome as any other, though not quite so palatable. His men suffered from indigestion after eating it; but this he attributes to the quantity, and not to the quality, of the meat they had eaten.

There seems to be little doubt that the liver is highly deleterious. Some of the sailors of Barentz, who made a meal of it, were very sick, "and we verily thought we should have lost them, for all their skins came off from the foot to the head."

The skin of the bear is covered with long yellowish white hair, which, is very close, and forms a wonderful defence against the cold, and against the tusk of the animals on which it feeds. We heard of another use of this hair from an officer on one of the late Arctic searching expeditions. A bear was seen to come down a tolerably high and steep declivity by sliding down on its hinder quarters, in an attitude known, in more than one part of the British Islands, by the expressive name of "katy-hunkers;" the shaggy hair with which it was covered serving like a thick mat to protect the creature from injury. The Esquimaux prepare the skin sometimes without ripping it up, and turning the hairy side inward a warm sack-like bed is formed, into which they creep, and lie very comfortably. Otho Fabricius, in his "Fauna Grænlandica" (p. 24), informs us that the tendons are converted into sewing threads. The female bear has one or two, and sometimes three, cubs at a time. They are born in the winter, and the mother generally digs for them and for herself a snug nestling-place in the snow. The males in the winter time leave the coast, and go out on the ice-fields, to the edge of the open water after seals.--Adam White, in "Excelsior" (with additions).

NELSON AND THE POLAR BEAR.

In 1773, Captain Phipps, afterwards Lord Mulgrave, sailed on a voyage of discovery towards the North Pole. In this expedition sailed two Norfolk young men, one in his twenty-third year, the other a mere lad in his fifteenth year. The former sailed from a spirit of curiosity, and being sorely distressed by sea-sickness was landed in Norway. He afterwards became famous in the British Parliament, and the speeches of the Right Hon. William Windham, Secretary at War, are often referred to even now. The younger man was Horatio Nelson, cockswain under Captain Lutwidge, who was killed at the battle of Trafalgar, thirty-two years after his Polar expedition, and left a name which is synonymous with the glory of the British navy.

Southey, in his admirable life, records an instance of his hardihood on this expedition:--"One night, during the mid-watch, he stole from the ship with one of his comrades, taking advantage of a rising fog, and set off over the ice in pursuit of a bear. It was not long before they were missed. The fog thickened, and Captain Lutwidge and his officers became exceedingly alarmed for their safety. Between three and four in the morning the weather cleared, and the two adventurers were seen at a considerable distance from the ship attacking a huge bear. The signal for them to return was immediately made; Nelsons' comrade called upon him to obey it, but in vain; his musket had flashed in the pan; their ammunition was expended; and a chasm in the ice, which divided him from the bear, probably preserved his life. 'Never mind,' he cried; 'do but let me get a blow at this devil with the butt-end of my musket, and we shall have him.' Captain Lutwidge, however, seeing his danger, fired a gun, which had the desired effect of frightening the beast; and the boy then returned, somewhat afraid of the consequences of his trespass. The captain reprimanded him sternly for conduct so unworthy of the office which he filled, and desired to know what motive he could have for hunting a bear. 'Sir,' said he, pouting his lip, as he was wont to do when agitated, 'I wished to kill the bear, that I might carry the skin to my father.'"

A CLEVER POLAR BEAR.

Mr Markham, when the ship Assistance was in the Wellington Channel, observed several bears prowling about in search of seals. "On one occasion," he writes, "I saw a bear swimming across a lane of water, and pushing a large piece of ice before him. Landing on the floe, he advanced stealthily towards a couple of seals, which were basking in the sun at some little distance, still holding the ice in front to hide his black muzzle; but this most sagacious of bears was for once outwitted, for the seals dived into a pool of water before he could get within reach. On another occasion, a female Bruin having been shot from the deck of the Intrepid, her affectionate cub, an animal about the size of a large Newfoundland dog, remained resolutely by the side of its mother, and on the approach of the commander of the Intrepid with part of his crew, a sort of tournament ensued, in which the youthful bear, although belaboured most savagely, showed a gallant resistance, and at length rushing between the legs of the corporal of marines, laid him prostrate on the ice, floored another man, who had seized hold of his tail, and effected his escape."

CAPTAIN OMMANEY AND THE POLAR BEAR.

Captain Ommaney, who led one of the travelling parties in 1851 sent out from the ships under Austin in search of Franklin on the 12th of June, the day before he arrived at the ships, met with a laughable accident, although it might have had a serious termination. They had all of them but just got into their blanket bags, when a peculiar noise, as if something was rubbing up the snow, was heard outside. The gallant captain instantly divined its cause, seized, loaded, and cocked his gun, and ordered the tent door to be opened, upon which a huge bear was seen outside. Captain Ommaney fired at the animal, but, whether from the benumbed state of his limbs, or the dim glimmering light, he unfortunately missed him, and shot away the rope that supported the tent instead. The enraged monster then poked his head against the poles, and the tent fell upon its terrified inmates, and embraced them in its folds. Their confusion and dismay can more easily be imagined than described, but at length one man, with more self-possession than the rest, slipped out of his bag, scrambled from under the prostrate tent, and ran to the sledge for another gun; and it was well that he did so, for no sooner had he vacated his sleeping sack than Bruin seized it between his teeth, and shook it violently, with the evident intention of wreaking his vengeance on its inmate. He was, however, speedily despatched by a well-aimed shot from the man, the tent was repitched, and tranquillity restored.

FOOTNOTES:

"Hungary and Transylvania," &c., by John Paget, Esq., vol. ii. p. 445.

"Conversations of Lord Byron," p. 72.

"Master Humphrey's Clock."

Mark Lemon, "Jest Book," p. 331

Those "Arctic hedge-rows," as Mr David Walker calls them, when, on the 30th November 1857, he was on board the Arctic yacht Fox, wintering in the floe-ice of Baffin's Bay. "The scene apparent on going on deck after breakfast was splendid, and unlike anything I ever saw before. The subdued light of the moon thrown over such a vast expanse of ice, in the distance the loom of a berg, or the shadow of the hummocks (the Arctic hedge-rows), the only thing to break the even surface, a few stars peeping out, as if gazing in wonder at the spectacle,--all united to render the prospect striking, and lead one to contemplate the goodness and power of the Creator." On the 2d November, they had killed a bear, which had been bayed and surrounded by their Esquimaux dogs. Captain M'Clintock shot him. He was 7 feet 3 inches long. Only one of the dogs was injured by his paws. Much did the hungry beasts enjoy their feast, for they "were regaled with the entrails, which they polished off in a very short time."--Mr Walker, in "Belfast News Letter," quoted in "Dublin Natural History Review," 1858, p. 180.

"Account of Arctic Regions," i. 517.

The anecdote is given with more detail at p. 67.

"Attempt to Reach the North Pole," p. 115.

"Life of Nelson," by Robert Southey, Esq., LL.D., Poet Laureate, p. 11.

"Franklin's Footsteps," by Clement R. Markham, p. 65.

"Franklin's Footsteps," by Clement Robert Markham, late of H.M.S. Assistance, p. 93.

RACCOON.

A strikingly pretty, well-clad, and pleasingly coloured North American quadruped, of which many zoological anecdotes might be given. Linnæus named it Ursu lotor, or the Washer, from its curious habit of putting any food offered to it, at least when in confinement, into water, before attempting to eat it.

"A GONE COON."

An American phrase for "the last extremity," or, "it's all up." They say that a Major, or Colonel, or General Scott "down South" was notorious as a dead shot. Once on a time, when out with his gun, he espied a raccoon on a lofty tree. The poor raccoon, noticing the gun pointed at him, cried to the dead shot, "Air you General Scott?"--"I air."--"Then wait, I air a comin' down, for I air a gone coon."