24 ^The Grizzly Bear 



from the white bear of this country and from the black 

 bear of the^Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, which two last 

 seemed to form only one species. The common black 

 bear is indeed unknown in this country, for the bear of 

 which we are speaking, though in most respects similar, 

 differs from it in having much finer, thicker, and longer 

 hair, with a greater proportion of fur mixed with it, and 

 also in having a variety of colors, while the common black 

 bear has no intermixture or change of color, but is of a 

 uniform black." 



It may here be noted that scientific naturalists, in their 

 latest classifications of bears, while upholding Lewis and 

 Clark in their surmises regarding the grizzlies, overrule 

 them in their assumption that the other "black, brown, 

 etc., bear'' of the Rocky Mountain regions form a differ- 

 ent species from the common black bear. 



July 15, 1806. At the Falls of the Missouri again. 

 "At night McNeal, who had been sent in the morning to 

 examine the cache at the lower end of the portage, re- 

 turned, but had been prevented from reaching that place 

 by a singular adventure. Just as he arrived near Willow 

 Run, he approached a thicket of brush, in which was a 

 white bear, which he did not discover till he was within 

 ten feet of him. His horse started and wheeled suddenly 

 round, throwing McNeal almost immediately under the 

 bear, which started up instantly. Finding the bear rais- 

 ing himself on his hind feet to attack him, he strj^ck him 

 on the head with the butt end of his musket; the blow was 

 so violent that it broke the breach of the musket and 

 knocked the bear to the ground. Before he recovered 

 McNeal, seeing a willow tree close by, sprang up and 



