Aug. 1859. THE POLAR BEAR. 291 



tent down on themselves ! but bruin had snuffed the pem- 

 mican on the sledge, and turned deliberately to inspect it, 

 when he was, of course, shot. 



The sleepers in one of the ' Fox's ' tents were aroused by 

 a bear's paw breaking through their calico shelter ! 



The motive which usually led our searching parties to 

 slaughter bears was to obtain their blubber for fuel, and 

 their flesh for the dogs. In this way we have made them 

 very useful to us ; but they have often damaged our caches 

 of provisions, destroyed any packages not strong enough to 

 resist both their claws and their weight, rolled the casks 

 about, and have invariably broken down the oars or poles 

 erected as marks. 



Captain Collinson records that " a bear broke open his 

 depot, helped himself to pork and sugar, and " — worst of all 

 — " extracted the bung from a barico of spirits and capsized 

 it." It has occasionally happened that a man and a bear 

 have unexpectedly found themselves close together, when, 

 after an anxious gaze, they have mutually avoided each 

 other, with as little loss of dignity and as much show of 

 deliberation as possible ! 



I believe the only part of the arctic regions where bears 

 have not been found is on the northern shores of Melville 

 and Prince Patrick's Islands. 



In the summer of 1850, one was shot within twenty-five 

 miles of Beechey Island, at which it will be remembered that 

 Franklin's ships spent the winter of 1845-6 ; under an old 

 scar a large belted bullet was found ; it had been fired from 

 a two-grooved rifle, such as was formerly used in the naval 

 service, and had been supplied to Franklin's expedition. In 

 no other way can we account for the presence of this leaden 

 messenger ! 



Throughout our winter at Port Leopold, in 1848-9, there 

 were some very steep banks of hard snow against the face 



u 2 



